


the hoopoe and the moon

by nantes (titians)



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Alternate Universe - Historical, Extramarital Affairs, F/M, Minor Character Death, Period Typical Sexism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-23
Updated: 2016-04-23
Packaged: 2018-06-03 23:48:05
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 29,775
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6631978
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/titians/pseuds/nantes
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(or 'How the Devil Found His Way into a Marriage Bed'.) Once upon a time, a little Catholic princess sacrificed herself and her hand in marriage to the bed of the Protestant king just for peace across the land.  In return for her efforts, all Hell broke loose. <em>A French War of Religion AU.</em></p>
            </blockquote>





	the hoopoe and the moon

**Author's Note:**

  * For [djinndreaming](https://archiveofourown.org/users/djinndreaming/gifts).



> **A / N :** 1\. Pansy Parkinson means a lot to me – she is brave and wonderful for standing before Hogwarts and saying the unpopular idea of 'sacrifice the few to save the many', so here's a long ass fic where Pansy is brave and wonderful and sacrifices herself to save the many. 2. I have probably watched _[La Reine Margot](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WM9WohA4ae8)_ way too many times in the last few days because this is basically that and I'm sorry I'm not sorry. 3. The titles comes from the myth of Philomela which is horrific and sad [warning: rape and mutilation if you do google it but I am not linking anyone to anything] but has little to do with the actual fic. And 4. Pansy's siblings are three brothers, one older, two younger – Persimmon, Posey and Pine – and a younger sister, Primrose. Just so you're prepared.

> Fear the goat from the front,  
>  Fear the horse from the rear,  
>  And fear the man from all sides.
> 
> **A S S Y R I A N  P R O V E R B**
> 
>  
> 
> What bloodshed! What murders! What evil counsel I have followed! Oh my God, forgive me! I am lost, I am lost!
> 
> **K I N G  C H A R L E S  I X  O F  F R A N C E**
> 
>  
> 
> _ A che v'armate _  
>  _ Sitting contr'un cor ch'ѐ gia preso, e vi si rende? _  
>  _ Ancidete i rubelli _  
>  _ Ancidete chi s'arma e si difende, _  
>  _ Non chi, vinto, v'adora. _
> 
> **C L A U D I O  M O N T E V E R D I**  
> 

 

 

**i.  A C T  O N E :  a  w e d d i n g**  


 

Pansy fumbles with an answer. She feels every pair of eyes in the room upon her – out of the corner of her own she catches the flicker of Astoria leaning in to whisper something to Lady Malfoy next to her. In front of herself, Pansy twists her fingers together, struggling not to reach up and scratch at her neck, to use her arm as a shield and reveal her weakness; she spins her emerald ring over and over between forefinger and thumb. Before her, Posey moves forwards in his chair.

He coughs once.

Pansy knows her brother, _the King_ , is waiting for an answer.

She looks to his face, spinning her ring once more, but finds no comfort in it.

If her father were still on the throne, Pansy wouldn't be standing here. She wouldn't be avoiding the gaze of everyone in the room if her father were king, but he's been dead too long to think of him for sanctuary now. The court waits for her answer and Pansy wishes it were anyone other than her younger brother asking this request.

"Well?" Posey coaxes. "Will you marry him?"

Pansy hesitates.

With a sigh, Posey says, "For the sake of _peace_ , will you marry him?"

To Posey's left sits Lord Malfoy, stony and unshaking with his silvery mane of hair all around his shoulders; to Posey's right is the newly titled Duchess of Lorraine, Lady Black-Lestrange. Both of them now stare at Pansy, their faces settled in well practiced expressions of mutual superiority. Pansy lets her eyes move over them before she answers. "For you, brother," and somehow she manages to keep the shake out of her voice, "I will."

Upon the two faces either side of the King matching smiles spread, almost snarls as they expose their teeth.

 

+

 

Blaise nudges the glass of wine closer to her but Pansy doesn't take it. He just sighs. And settles with his back against the wall, legs and feet thrown up on the golden embroidered cushions covering the window seat. "You're getting married," he says, sounding bored, "shouldn't you at least be smiling a little, _your Majesty_?"

Pansy glares at him for the title – he only ever uses it when he is trying to irk her as he is one of the few courtiers Pansy allows to regularly call her by her name. She blinks once she's finished glaring, then returns quickly to it when she realises that Blaise has no idea what her impending marriage actually means.

"You'll get wrinkles on your brow," he states. His wine glass is empty and he motions towards a passing server for more.

All Pansy has to throw back is, "I don't care."

Blaise laughs at this. He tosses a quick 'thank you' at the server, who slips away as silently as they approached, and turns to Pansy to tell her, "Of course you do. Everybody cares about getting wrinkles and anyone who says they don't is a liar." Pansy just rolls her eyes and lets her friend push her wine glass closer to her. "C'mon, drink with me. In a few days you will be married and I will have lost my drinking partner to a husband – allow me to celebrate being your friend for now."

Pansy hums.

The wine is sweeter than she would usually like but for Blaise she drinks it. "There," she says, and motions dramatically at the empty glass, "I am drinking with you; I am celebrating; I am your friend." She pauses, just for a breath, "For we know I cannot lose anymore of those."

Blaise scoffs into the mouth of his glass. It makes wine slosh over the rim, landing on Pansy's skirt and spreading through the material, ruddy like a bloodstain.

"Oh, don't tell me you are frowning because of Daphne- is that what this is about?"

"She hasn't spoken to me in over a week. I am certain she can't even bear to be in the same room as me."

Again, Blaise scoffs. He swipes his hand through the air dismissively, as though wiping Pansy's words away. "You're marrying her lover," he states plainly. "Let her be mad at you for now, but once she passed the anger and realises why you must marry him, she will come back."

Pansy raises a brow.

"Peace and religious freedom in France, those are things that even Daphne's heartbreak can't argue with."

He isn't wrong. At least, his logic isn't flawed, even if the reasons he believes the marriage is taking place are incorrect. But Pansy doesn't tell him this, doesn't voice her concerns that perhaps her marriage has a more sinister reasoning behind it than peace – anyone with even half a knowledge of the politics within this court knows that the Catholic families, especially the near fanatical Blacks and Malfoys, have long wanted control over the Protestant kings of Navarre and Bourbon. And Pansy knows she is merely a scapegoat in succeeding in their ends.

From this thought, she doesn't smile.

Roaming his eyes over the rest of the room, Blaise spots Cho and shouts across, "Cho, my darling, Cho, come here at once. Her Majesty will not smile for me tonight. I need your expertise on the matter," tossing out a histrionic sigh for good measure.

Cho rises up from her seat, a few of the other ladies watching her, and throws herself upon Pansy, kneeling on her skirts as she rests her face against Pansy's chest with an 'Oh, whatever is the matter?'

Pansy can't help but laugh at this, leaning in and placing a kiss on Cho's dark hair. 

"See," Blaise waves, twirling his hand through the air, "for you, she smiles; for me, nothing but a frown. I should have called you over sooner."

Lifting and turning her face to look directly at Pansy, her hand coming to rest on the spot where Pansy's neck flows to shoulder, warm and solid as it presses against Pansy's bare skin, Cho asks, "You are alright, aren't you?" And when Pansy nods, Cho's fingers move again, cupping her face as she angles Pansy's head to lean against hers.

"Of course, of course," Pansy insists, whispered in close to Cho's cheek.

Cho takes her at her word, releasing Pansy backwards but keeping her hand cupped around her jaw.

A knock at the door silences the room. Pansy turns towards it but Cho doesn't lower her hand – Pansy doesn't ask her to. She sounds out, "Enter." One of her ladies moves out of the way of the door pushing into the room.

In a flash of purple and gold, Posey enters, flanked on one side by Draco, while on the other stands Oliver, Pansy's intended, wearing black as if mourning and a face that suggests he would rather be anywhere than here. Neither one of the two men smile as Posey beams, so wide the skin around his eyes crinkles in delight. "We heard music, we came to see if we were perhaps uninvited from a party you were having, sister," he says, stepping further into the room and revealing his entourage is a lot larger than just two other men.

Cho lets Pansy up but stays close, their hands brushing as Pansy moves to greet her brother. "Not invite you to a party," she laughs, "why would you ever think I would do such a thing?" Her brother gives her a look she chooses to ignore; it's a sharp, hurt thing that reminds Pansy of Fontainebleau, of times when they both wore younger faces and still had a father, an older brother. She squashes the feeling away and kisses Posey twice on both cheeks. "Come, join us, we were just enjoying some music and good company," she says in lieu of an apology.

At this the musicians start up into a rondo. 

As Posey takes a seat at the table, helping himself to a pack of cards and motioning for Oliver, Draco, a few of the others to join him, Pine makes a break from the crowd of men. He looks lost amongst them even as he stands the same height as them all. He steps into Pansy's open arms, smiling softly as she pulls him close and Cho runs a hand over his dark curls in greeting.

"May I stay?" he asks. His voice is a note above begging. Pansy feels a smile take over her face as she nods.

"But no wine," she says, releasing her younger brother. He steps back with a nod of his own. "And only for a while – when it gets too late, I will have your nurse bring you to your rooms, yes?" He may be fourteen now but he is still the youngest, the baby of them all, and Pansy will continue to treat him as such until he is old and married.

Pine gives her a 'yes' and heads towards the musicians.

Cho butts her arm against Pansy's. "It is already late."

Pansy watches him move into a chair, fixing the slight cape of his jacket before settling more comfortably into his seat. He leans into the mandolin player, obviously asking for a turn with the instrument. Pansy can't help smiling. "Let him have his fun," she returns. "We won't let him stay up too much later."

With the presence of the King now in the room, the gathering drags on and on. People excuse themselves from the room in ones and twos as the hour grows darker; some come back after a while, but most disappear for the night. 

At the table, Posey continues to play cards. The stack of money in front of him grows and grows with each game, Draco's own purse decreasing the same amount and Pansy wonders if he has been told to let the King win every game or if he is afraid of his family's response if he goes back and tells them he won.

Around the room a few of her ladies are sleeping. Millicent sleeps open mouthed and lightly breathing, leaning on the shoulder of a server holding a candle inside a large paper lantern. Cho sits on the window seat next to Blaise, eyelids heavy but managing to watch him throw dice out of an empty cup onto the cushions between them. She catches Pansy's eye and sleepily smiles as Pansy moves by, her skirts sweeping over the stone floor. She hasn't sat for the last hour.

Posey is dealing the next hand when she asks, "Have you seen Primrose?"

Draco answers for the King. "She was not in the room when we entered, therefore she must be elsewhere."

"I'm sure she's fine," Posey adds.

Pansy steps away from them with a sigh. Even within the palace there are hundreds of places their sister could be, most of them definitely not ' _fine_ ', but Pansy has a suspicion Primrose isn't on palace grounds. She goes back to where Cho and Blaise sit, still tossing the dice. It falls to the floor with a sharp clatter but no one pays them any attention. Pansy swoops down to pick it up, one hand resting on Cho's skirts for balance.

She says, "Distract them for me. I'm going to find Prim."

Cho moves, more awake. "Want me to come with you?" And Pansy shakes her head.

Rising back up, she lets Blaise take her hand, a suddenly serious look on his features, and a soft note of caring in his voice as he says, "Be careful. The city is full of strangers at the moment." He squeezes her fingers to emphasise his point.

"I'll be fine," she insists.

 

+

 

She uses the excuse of making sure Pine makes it to bed to leave the room, then borrows a cloak from his nurse and slips down a back stairs so no one catches her. At the bottom of them, two soldiers pass, their armour clank clank clanking together at their knees and elbows, and she waits for the sound to die before stepping out into the corridor.

The mask secured across her nose and face may hide who she is from the people in the city, outside the palace, but inside the palace she is still recognisable.

Pansy practically jumps out of her skin, her whole body breaking into gooseflesh when someone calls out to her from a balcony. It takes her a moment to find him, the room behind him dark and making his balcony seem the same as so many others. But there, a floor above her, is Oliver. He had left her rooms hours ago, informing the King of needing sleep. Now, his shirt is untucked from his breeches and his hair is tousled as if he has only just risen from sleep.

She waits for him to recognise her.

"Is the hour not too late for a woman to be walking the grounds alone?" he questions.

Pansy can't not answer him. He has asked her a direct question. It would seem he hasn't recognised her yet, the shadows and the mask disguising her enough to keep her identity from him, but her voice might yet give it away. They have only met a few times before, spoken less than that, but he still could. She coughs, testing the air, and answers, "I have walked these grounds alone many a time before without mishap."

He smiles at this.

"Unless you, sir, are suggesting my fortune will change for the evening."

He considers her words. "I only stated it to offer my services as chaperone as you walk. It would just take me a moment or two to come down to you and then you could continue your walk as before and I would feel better knowing you are safe in my company."

Pansy has to admit he has a way with words. Perhaps if he wasn't going to be marrying _her_ in a few days' time, she would be charmed – for all he knows currently she is a lady of the court, she may even be married, yet here he is, flirting with her.

"I don't need a chaperone, sir," she says. "Especially one so soon to be married. I'm not sure the rest of the court would approve."

Even in the dim light Pansy catches the way Oliver's face moves into a frown. He sighs, loud and from the chest, ends it with a groan. "My marriage is little more than a political inconvenience, nothing for you to worry about upsetting." He wets his lips with his tongue before he says his next line. "But if it upsets you this much, I apologise for offending you and wish you a good walk."

Pansy bristles.

She gives him a curt nod and heads on, not bothering with the formality of a goodbye. She doesn't care to waste her breath.

 

+

 

Pansy finds Primrose in a tavern. Like her sister, she wears a black mask, obscuring half her face. Around the table with her are the Italian ambassador's men, a scattering of the men sent by the Pope to pass his blessings onto Pansy's wedding and marriage. Primrose laughs and her face catches the light from the candles all around.

One of the men gropes for Pansy as she tries to slip by – she shoots him a look and his hand drops away, as if she has burned him. Primrose knows her in an instant, a smile taking over her face. "Darling," she announces, "what are you doing here?"

Someone at the table orders another round from the barman.

"I came looking for you. What are _you_ doing here?"

Primrose hums out a noise, a bit snotty and put out, as if her older sister should know exactly why she is sitting, masked, in this tavern, but she explains for her all the same. "I'm entertaining the Italians. Since no one else is."

With a sigh, Pansy replies, "And that is very kind of you, thank you for treating our guests well. But you have been missing from the palace for hours and it is late."

A couple tables over from them, someone shouts. Pansy looks over her shoulder towards the noise. The sound of a chair's legs dragging along the floor shrieks out throughout the room, shrill and sharp enough to make Pansy grit her teeth against it. Someone, tall, thin shouldered, brown hair and large, crooked teeth, stands themselves higher than the rest of his group. Pansy looks at Primrose and sees she has spotted the commotion as well. "C'mon," she says, "we had best get out of here."

Primrose doesn't move.

Pansy just glares at her.

"You know," Primrose says, sounding it out thoughtfully, "before you came, maybe an hour or so ago, that table was ranting about Calvin. It was amusing."

Pansy is pretty sure it was not, that her sister is saying it to fluster her, but she bites her tongue and doesn't give Primrose the satisfaction.

"They spoke of you too."

Pansy gets off the bench silently. A few of the men at the table cast her a look but quickly return to their conversations. The mask blocks out a lot of unwanted attention – without them on, Primrose and Pansy would be recognisable, and easier to notice as sisters. Pansy may be sharper, more cheekbones and a mouth better suited for frowning compared to Primrose's soft, rosebud mouth, and Primrose's eyes are greener than Pansy's, but there is no denying who they are. Pansy wonders how many of the men would have turned back to their conversation if they knew who she was.

"Pan," Primrose tries, for a third time. She gives her sister her attention. "They weren't exactly kind."

"I'm sure they weren't," she replies. She looks over at the table as she fixes her cape. Most of those seated around it are nothing more than students, young men around Posey's age. Again, she wonders how many of them would turn to their conversation if they knew who she was.

It doesn't bear thinking about.

Primrose grabs her hand. Pansy's vision blurs out of and back into focus and she once more pays attention to the young man standing on the chair. His face has turned red with the intensity of his words. Pansy speaks to Primrose without taking her eyes off him. "Say your goodbyes, we must get back to the Louvre."

On the walk back Primrose never lets go of Pansy's hand even if it means her cloak slips off one shoulder, dragging along the dusty ground.

Her face is pale as she says 'goodnight' to Pansy outside her rooms. Pansy doesn't linger on it.

 

+

 

That night, Pansy dreams of Fontainebleau. She dreams of Persimmon in a green hunting jacket riding a grey horse. The horse falls and when Pansy wakes with a start, Cho's arms wrapping around her in an instant with a soothing hand in her hair, Pansy can still recall the sound of Persimmon's scream, the crack of the horse's bones long moments later.

 

+

 

There is rain drying on the cobbles on the ground outside Pansy's windows the morning of her wedding. It is August, late in the month, a surprising chill holds the air, and Pansy develops a shiver she cannot rid herself of. Lady Malfoy, as a princess of the blood, gets to assist Pansy dressing – she insists it is nerves, a silly thing, something that will pass once she is in her dress. But when Pansy turns to look at her face as she tightens the ribbons against Pansy's spine, there is something soft, almost motherly to Lady Malfoy's look back at her, a worry about her eyes and mouth so clear Pansy wants to ask her what she isn't telling her. Pansy's hands shake so badly as Cho tries to ties a pearl bracelet around her wrist that it slips from her arm to the floor twice before they get it settled. Pansy tries not to view it all as an omen.

From her dress to the flowers decorating the church and the ribbon-and-pearl twists in Pansy's dark hair, everything feels too gaudy and showy to be real. But there is no magic in the unreality of it all. Just the vicious glaring of how farcical the whole day is. She feels stuffed and pinned and bound into place, into it all.

Outside the church Pansy stops.

Cho guides the other bridesmaids to place Pansy's train on the ground, giving her freedom to move without them all having to follow her. She takes a step to the right of the door and lets her hand find her chest, pausing to breathe; she can't tell if her hand or her lungs tremble more.

Cho takes her hand without being beckoned. Her skin is warm against Pansy's.

There is no one to walk Pansy down the aisle. Once she resumes walking into the church, Cho will return to her spot holding Pansy's train, and Pansy's hands will go back to shaking with no one to hold them. She wishes Persimmon were here, for as King or not he would be by her side right now. But Persimmon has been dead for over three years and Posey is already sitting inside the church, surrounded by Malfoys, Lestranges and Blacks, and Pansy stands outside the doors of a church shaking.

She has to close her eyes.

"I'm alright," she says, quiet, barely above a whisper. Cho hears her but doesn't let go of Pansy's hand. "Honestly, I am. We should get inside before the hour is too late and they all grow bored with their waiting for us."

Millicent laughs.

Cho squeezes Pansy's hand. Her rings press into her fingers, sharp and cutting but Pansy doesn't flinch, just keeps her hand with Cho's for another second longer. But eventually she has to let go. She has to say, "Let's go," and cast a glance at the server waiting to the left, who scurries inside the church by a side door and tells the choir to begin.

Pansy enters the basilica of Saint-Denis with six bridesmaids holding her train and the organ playing Flitwick's newest, specially written piece for her. She wears red and gold, the colours of the Kingdom of Navarre, and her soon to be husband wears black as he waits by the altar for her. Wearing as much gold and red as she is stands the Bishop – he watches her approach with a stern look upon his face while Oliver remains staring forwards. Pansy's hands continue to shake.

 

+

 

The Bishop asks Oliver, "Do you, Oliver Bourbon of Navarre, accept Pansy of Valois and France as your wife?" and Oliver pauses.

Pansy lets her gaze flicker over to him. Oliver just stares ahead. He blinks four times before she looks away, returning her focus to the Bishop and the large bejewelled cross at his breast. The church is silent. From behind her, Pansy hears someone move, the shift of silk against the wooden pews.

When she looks at him again, Oliver has lowered his eyes, is now staring at his hands clasped in front of him. His knuckles are white.

He answers, "I do."

 

+

 

"Come along," Primrose all but sing-songs at them, looping Pansy's arm with her own and dragging her. It is her wedding day, the wine is flowing freely, and Pansy allows herself a laugh as she tumbles after her sister, reaching out behind her to securely grab Cho's arm. "I will introduce you to one of Pope's men, honestly, you'll love them all."

She knows Primrose doesn't mean it, but the words stab at Pansy's throat, stealing her breath for a moment. She grips Cho tighter as they move through the crowds, various Lords, Dukes, Viscounts calling out their congratulations to her as they pass them by, and Pansy lets the sickly feeling leave her chest amid the noise and bustle. She always knew she was never going to get a proper wedding night with Oliver, she shouldn't have been caught by such surprise.

A musician must spot her because from somewhere in the crowd comes the sound of her name, lush and thick on the singer's voice as they are accompanied by strings; a mandolin, a lute, a violin. A smile makes her show her teeth and Cho laughs in triumph.

The three of them settle on a bench in the centre of the grass, immediately freed up as the original occupants see them approaching. Pansy throws them a 'thank you', rushed out on a breath, but it is thrown back at her with a 'Majesty, of course'. Primrose kneels behind her once Pansy is seated, a hand carelessly laid upon her sister's shoulder as she uses her vantage point to find good looking men in the crowds, while Cho sits next to Pansy, allowing Pansy to tuck herself in against her as their skirts overlap.

"What about him?" Primrose shouts, unsubtle and loud.

Pansy's eyes follow her finger.

She has to agree, her sister has picked a handsome man. But his face is familiar. "No," she sighs, "not him. That's Oliver's cousin, Cedric."

Cho makes a sound. "If you won't have him, I still might," she gets out before descending into laughter. Pansy places her hand against Cho's cheek, feels how she laughs as she presses her face into Pansy's shoulder. She sobers up as people look at them, quickly retracting with, "Of course, I wouldn't do that to you, your Majesty."

"I don't care who you do," Pansy answers.

It sets Cho off laughing again.

A flurry of peacock blue satin and silver brocade comes charging out from the crowd along with a shout of her name. Pansy feels Primrose's knee almost slip from the edge of the bench. "Pansy," calls out the voice again, and there, panting in front of her is Pine. He sends the whole bench toppling over as he barrels into them, red faced from the wine and beaming so brightly Pansy can't be upset with him. "Pansy, you're married," he says, "what are you doing on the grass?"

Around a laugh she pushes out, "You put me down here."

Stepping out from the crowd, a group of men come to help them all up, two of them tending to Primrose who took the worst of the fall. When one of them calls her 'Bella Princessa' Pansy realises they are Primrose's Italian friends from the tavern a few nights ago. She allows one of them to lift her up, even if it is more difficult for him than it should be but Pine refuses to let go of her.

"You're married," Pine repeats.

"I am."

The bench is set to rights once more and the Italian who lifted her up places his hand on Pansy's neck, thumb against her nape where her long, dark hair has been brushed away from it, and asks, " _Bene_?"

She spins in his arms, taking Pine with her, and tells him, "Yes, yes, I am quite well," as she pulls him in to hug him. It is her wedding day, she is allowed express her happiness with whomever she chooses; her newly made Italian friend seems more than delighted with the outcome, kissing her cheek. Poor Pine gets trapped between them, squashed in and surrounded by the thick material of Pansy's skirt, but if he is going to be so unwilling to let her go then these things can't be helped.

Her Italian lets go of her with a booming laugh and another kiss to her cheek and Pine looks up at her with a frown. His hair is ruffled from where the man's shirt dragged against it, and there's the pattern of the golden threading on Pansy's corset all across Pine's cheek and nose. She chuckles softly at the sight of him.

"Do you know him?" he asks, watching the man walk back into the crowds.

Pine doesn't really fit on the bench with the other three but he does his best to climb on both his older sisters' laps and make a spot for himself perched on them.

Once he has finally settled, Pansy rests her chin on his wild curls. "First time I have ever met him. He was passing on his well wishes and happiness for me on my wedding day."

Primrose snorts, pushing a laugh out of her nose.

"Guido is very sweet but completely not your type."

"I wasn't-" Pansy starts but isn't permitted to go any further with it.

Her sister looks at her, holding her eyes. "I know," she huffs, "I am just saying."

Pine perks up. "What?"

Pansy shares a look with Cho who barely shrugs before she goes back to looking for Cedric amongst the people. Pansy must admit, he is handsome – all regal cheekbones and silky auburn waves of hair on his head – but he is also unfortunately her new husband's cousin, related now to her in marriage, and the closeness feels too much. Yet if Cho has her eye on him, Pansy wholeheartedly approves. Watching Cho's face as she searches through the crowd of men around them, Pansy tells Pine, "We're looking for men," because _why not_ tell him exactly what they're doing?

Cho looks appalled at what Pansy has just done but doesn't take her eyes away from the crowd. Pine gasps, plainly shocked, and beside him Primrose laughs. He sounds terribly aghast about it all. 

Turning to him with a smile, Pansy places her hand on Pine's stomach, holding him to her, and shifts her mouth closer to his ear. "Firstly, there's no harm in looking – our sister may be trying to find a man for me, but I have not agreed to actually do anything other than look. And secondly, we're currently looking for Cho."

"But you have a husband!" Pine sounds appalled and delighted all at once.

"Yes," Pansy agrees, and easily finds Oliver in the crowd. "I do. He's right over there, speaking to his cousin." With a glance at Cho, she says, "You should go over and say 'hello', see what they are talking about."

Cho wrinkles her nose but is already rising out of her seat. "You're a demon," she tells Pansy.

Pansy cackles out a laugh. "According to gossips, you're right."

 

+

 

Astoria is the one to tell the men to lift Pansy's chair of the ground, to carry her to her rooms that way. The hour is late and Pansy has had too much wine to argue with her as she urges, "Up, higher." Pansy hoots out a laugh as Astoria fixes her skirts. They share a smile between them as Pansy tries to keep her balance – one of the men is taller than the others and it sets her chair at angle.

"What if they drop me?" she laughs. Her shoe falls from her foot.

Astoria looks serious, just for a moment, just long enough to say, "They won't," but it goes as quickly as it came and she is back to organising the chaos.

Pansy lets herself laugh at it all.

They come to a halt at the stairs, everyone realising at the same instance that Pansy's chair is too tall and the four men holding it up too wide to travel up the steps safely. The man on her right aides her down to the ground and Pansy thanks him, laughing with it, and hugs him quickly for his efforts. Astoria looks more than a little upset about the whole thing coming to an end.

"You should have let them try," she says, little more than a complaint.

"And bumped my head along the way?" Pansy is already three steps up on her friend. "That definitely would have ruined everybody's fun."

The sound of Astoria's soft foot falls follow Pansy up the stone stairs, a gentle pat pat pat behind her.

They are met at the top of the stairs by Millicent and Daphne looking frazzled and worried. This is the first Pansy has seen of Daphne in weeks, but she isn't allowed linger on it. She barely gets out a 'what is it?' before they're bustling her towards her door, Millicent urgently hissing, "He's been waiting for you."

Pansy doesn't get the chance to ask who they mean.

The door closes behind her, the other three locked out on the other side of it, and there, sitting in the middle of her room, cross legged on the floor, is Pine. His eyes are wet and he looks up at her through damp eyelashes, red rimmed eyes yet smiling. He is obviously drunk, and sways as he angles towards her. She doesn't ask if he's been crying, doesn't ask what is wrong, just simply drops to her knees before him. She's prepared for it when he falls against her. A snotty wet sound bubbles from his mouth and he says her name, a slur in his words.

"Do you know what you have done?" His voice is thick like a sob. "Do you know how much you have done with this?"

It isn't meant to slip out but when Pansy can't think of an answer a short burst of a laugh comes tumbling from her lips.

"You married him," Pine continues.

Pansy strokes his hair and responds, "Yes."

Pine wails against her, his hands becoming fists and striking at the material of her skirts. He hits as if trying to struggle away but buries his face deeper against her. Pansy holds him through it. "You married him. You married him," he just repeats over and over but this time Pansy stays quiet, not bothering to answer. "And Posey asked you to. He _made_ you."

"I said _yes_." Pine now clings, his knuckles tight with the force of it. Pansy tells him, "When I was asked, I said yes."

He slips down further. His face is pillowed against the heavy folds of her skirts, red and gold. "I should never have asked." Pine looks up to catch his sister's eye. Pansy touches lightly at his ear, soft but there, hoping to soothe through her skin on his. "Father wouldn't have asked you; _Persimmon_ would never have asked you." At their brother's name, Pine turns his face and wipes his tears into Pansy's dress. She just keeps touching him; his neck, his hair, his ear, the rise of his cheekbone.

"Don't-" she begins, but decides against continuing, starting against with, "they are not here. And Posey is not them, but that doesn't make him bad."

"You said yes."

Pansy sighs. "I did."

Pine explains, "They knew you would. They said it. Before he asked you, before you said yes, I overheard them telling him that you would say it when he asked. They knew."

"It's alright."

When Pine thrashes against her Pansy has to lift her hands away from him, letting him have the space to turn his head from side to side, nose butting into her through her skirts. "No, no, no," he repeats, twisting the words over and over and over again until Pansy loses count, can no longer keep up. She is stricken. "They have something planned. There's more to it. And you married him, it's already happening."

"Pine," she coaxes. He peers up at her, wide eyed and pale, like a deer about to bolt in front of a hunt. Pansy doesn't reach for him yet. "Yes, I married him. But that doesn't mean anything else is going to happen."

"They knew-" he tries, but Pansy cuts him off.

"Everyone knows I will say yes to anything you two ask of me, it's common knowledge."

"We can't keep everyone safe. . ."

Now, Pansy places her hand back on her brother. His cheek is damp and tinged pink and she strokes her thumb across it. "Don't worry like that," she declares, voice solid, "especially not about me, not today. It's my wedding day. Remember how happy you were for me earlier."

For her words Pine gives a smile. She returns it. 

"There, see. Only smiles today. Tomorrow, worries can come back but for now, for _me_ , you are only to smile. And let me worry in the morning, yes?" Pine nods.  
  
  
  
  
  


\+ + +

 

 

 

 

**i i .  A C T  T W O :  a  m a s s a c r e**  


 

By the morning, General Arthur Weasley has been shot.

He isn't dead, just laying bloody and struggling to breathe on a physician's table in one of the western rooms of the Louvre. And every Protestant in the city floods to the yard of the palace, clamouring for a word or a sight of their beloved general.

Pansy watches them from her window, the grass of the lawn trampled beneath all their feet. There is still bunting hung around the garden, yellow, red and gold, billowing against the light breeze, a stark contrast to the grey stone of the Louvre's walls and the rows upon rows of people in black, ready for mourning at the first word.

Behind her, Cho fusses with something, folding cloth and skirts and shirts while Millicent tries to get Pansy away from the window. "Your Majesty, come away from there," she hisses, not yet pulling Pansy away but only a second or two from it. "There will be a riot if you are seen."

"There is practically a riot already."

Millicent scoffs but leaves her to it, knows better to fight her point when Pansy is being contrary. Pansy watches her as she moves away, fixing a chair at the table, moving a silver jar of blush red a little further onto Pansy's vanity table before coming to a stop next to Cho as she continues to sort through materials and clothing. Pansy steps away from the window before she asks, making a point of the act as she does. "Millicent, go and fetch Blaise for me."

Millicent eyes her, unmoving.

"Thank you," Pansy adds, just to be proper. It makes a half smile come to Millicent's mouth and she gives Pansy a curtsey before she leaves. The door closes behind her and Pansy is over to Cho in an instant. "What have you heard?" she requests, pulling Cho away from the cupboards and towards a seat further from the door.

Cho casts an eye over at it just to be safe. She begins with, "There was talk this morning, I overheard it on my way back over here, that it was Catholic dissenters; a political killing to show their disapproval of your marriage."

She looks pale and severe, the colour grey awash over her features. Pansy presses their hands together. Cho tangles their fingers. Pansy doesn't speak, only waits for her friend to go on. "But three men, I passed them without them paying me any attention, but I heard them saying the shot was too clean, that the timing was too perfect for it not to have been a hired hand."

"An assassin could still have been paid for by dissenters."

Even Pansy doesn't believe her own words.

"He is still alive, or _was_ a few hours ago at least. But the crowd isn't going to disperse until they announce his death or he is brought to stand before them alive and well." Cho goes still, quiet and Pansy holds her breath. "And if he dies, it could mean trouble for your new husband."

Pansy chews on her lip, an old habit she had thought she was past, but right now it soothes her, calms her in the moment.

Cho looks her dead in the eyes. "Pansy, if the General dies and the Protestants rally behind Oliver, and if the killing were sanctioned by any member of our council, if any of them had a hand in it, your new husband may not survive much longer in the city."

"That is a lot of ifs." Pansy has to say it but the severity of Cho's look doesn't lessen. "But I had figured as much. As long as the General is alive, we have time."

Cho concludes, "Then we have best start praying to God for him."

 

+

 

Blaise enters the room with Millicent at his back.

Outside on the lawn the Protestant group has begun to sing hymns, loud praises to God and shouts to protect the General or give him a peaceful death. It fills the room, low notes and high, even with the windows locked and the heavy curtains drawn across them. Blaise grimaces at the sounds and tells Pansy, "I don't care much for your choice of music today." A scattering of her ladies twitter out laughs around the room but Pansy just motions her head towards her bedroom.

Cho gives her a nod and organises the rest of the ladies around a table, beginning to deal cards. Pansy slips away with Blaise quietly unnoticed.

"To what do I owe the pleasure of this summons?" he remarks, then makes a show of sitting on the end of her bed. She knows he is making a joke of things to calm but right now Pansy doesn't appreciate it. He crosses his legs at the ankles and pats the spot beside him for her. "Sit down before you faint," he says. "You look a little. . . harsh."

"Oliver may be in some danger."

"Good opener," Blaise remarks. "And what, you aren't ready to become a widow yet?"

Pansy glowers at him. "Be serious, sir."

Blaise sighs. "I am. A week ago you were going through the motions of getting ready for a wedding, but anyone with eyes could see you were dreading every second leading towards it. Why the sudden change of heart?" He looks at Pansy softly, almost to the point of pity, and Pansy's frown deepens. "You aren't-"

"Christ, no," and she lets out a laugh. "But no one deserves to die; it's the very reason I married him. To unite the religions, to show everyone that Catholics and Protestants could live in harmony with one another. I don't have to _love_ him, don't be so foolish to think I have gone and fallen into that trap, but I still do not want him dead."

"Majesty."

When Blaise reaches for her hand, Pansy moves it out of his reach. The shift away shocks him, Pansy knows this, but he recovers with a calm noise and restarts with, "No one is going to die."

It doesn't reassure Pansy in the slightest. Waving in the direction of her windows, where Protestant continue to sing hymns, verse after verse after verse along with cries for their fallen General, she hisses, "Won't they? We have a lawn full of Protestants chomping at the bit for the first word of General Weasley's death, and you can't tell me that any Catholic facing a Protestant riot won't use it as the perfect excuse to kill them."

This stills Blaise.

He asks, "And what can you do?"

"Get Oliver away from it all." She watches Blaise carefully, but he stares off to the corner of the room. "If he remains here, he is a target. Especially if General Weasley dies. But if we get him out of the city, get him somewhere else, somewhere safer than Paris, it would at least keep him alive a while longer."

"Where would you have him go?"

She responds, "Where can you get him?"

Blaise's laugh is soft, barely a hint of it in the air. He says, "I know of a few men who could help us, could get him out of Paris and to Calais, to a ship back to Navarre. . . but if this were to come back on me, the word 'treason' would be on everyone's lips," explaining what Pansy already knows.

Her hair loosens with the shake of her head. "I would never let it come to that. None of this is going to fall back on you – if anything arises from it, if any suspicion begins, I will admit my hand in it all." Blaise gasps. "Posey would never sign an execution warrant for me, no matter what pressure they put him under, and what else can they do? Exile me? No, that would send me straight to the Protestants they accuse me of committing treason for, and if they arrest me, detain me here, they can't stop the King from visiting me."

"You've thought this all through."

It's a statement but Pansy answers him anyway with, "Someone has to."

His head on her shoulder is oddly comforting. Blaise puts his mouth to her sleeve. "It doesn't have to be you."

Pansy only laughs. She sighs, suddenly weary. "Yes, it does," she admits, but saying it only makes her shoulders sag more, her whole body moving under the weight of the idea. "Who else is there?" Blaise nudges her with his nose. "Persimmon isn't here to do it."

Blaise shivers at the mention of Pansy's brother's name.

"I'm sorry," she admits. "I know-"

He breaks over the rest of her words with, "It's alright. You're right." Against her arm, Blaise whispers, "He would be proud of you." Again, it only makes Pansy laugh. "I mean it. He would be proud of you for this." His next breath brushes across her neck and Blaise has lifted his face away from her. Pansy takes a glance at his face. "And I'll see who I can find."

 

+

 

Blaise disappears for a few hours. When he returns, he has news, although small, not a fully formed plan but enough for Pansy to offer to Oliver.

"He's Protestant, but he says he will help us."

Blaise make speak the truth, but Pansy knows loyalty comes at a price. She removes her necklace, latch catching on her nail but it slips off her neck, heavy with the weight of the ruby hanging from it. "Find him again tonight, after I have told Oliver, and give him this."

He seems to consider it in his hand, moving his palm to let the light glint off the stone.

"He has already been paid."

"I'm buying his trust," she contends.

Getting to Oliver's rooms is difficult. After the first attempt to send Daphne to fetch him fails, Daphne returning to the room only moments after being told go, Pansy opens her door to find a guard she does not recognise positioned outside, armed with a halberd at his side. He turns his face to look at her, standing there, openly shocked, and greets her, "Majesty." And Pansy realises she and her ladies have been trapped in.

The secret stairs – Posey was insistent his sister was placed in a room with stairs he could access without having to travel through the main halls – only leads downwards and Pansy sends Millicent to check; she returns with confirmation that, yes, there is a guard at the bottom of the main stairs as well.

"Tell him," Pansy starts, but stops. She breathes for a moment, considering, and then retries with, "Go outside and tell him I wish to speak to my brother. Bother him. Ask him why a guard has been placed outside my rooms. Ask him why Daphne was not permitted to leave the hallway and had to return. Cause such a fuss, someone else must be called to handle the matter."

Three of them leave, doing as they are instructed in a cloud of chatter, making themselves truly loud before they have even reached the guard.

Cho looks hesitant. "Will this work?"

"We will send Blaise out in another minute, see if he can add to the commotion." As if on cue, Blaise looks up from his seat at the table, a book open on top of the wood, and gives them a smile. "A man's voice amid the ladies should inspire some sort of curiosity in the other guards."

It works, but barely. Pansy manages to slip out of the rooms after Blaise has gone out, his large, booming voice filling the hallway. But Cho is adamant she must go with Pansy. "Going alone is ridiculous; the two of us could have gone for a walk but if they were to find you alone, you would look immediately guilty."

Oddly, there is no guard at Oliver's door. The entire floor seems to be empty of people. And up on the third floor, the voices of from the people on the lawns are quieter, more muffled. A shiver runs up Pansy and through her shoulders.

At their first knock, no one answers.

Cho is the one to knock the second time and her knock is harder, demands more attention. She also knocks higher at the wood than she stands, the deceptive knock of a taller person. It rings out in the dead air of the empty space around them. But then, on the other side of the door, there comes the sound of shuffling and the metal bolt grinds open with a clank.

Cedric startles at the sight of them.

"Let them in," announces Oliver's voice from further in the room.

The hinges of the door creak with age, Cedric stepping back but still Pansy's skirt brushes off him as she passes.

Pansy can't tell if Oliver's rooms are one of the smaller sets in the palace or if they just appear small because of the sheer amount of people sitting in them. Amongst the faces looking back at her and Cho, she recognises only a handful. None of them look pleased to see her. At the sight of Oliver, she almost curtseys. _Almost_.

"Do you have news for us?" Oliver asks, seated on the edge of the bed, Marcus and Percy flanking him.

Pansy shakes her head. All the words she had before, her carefully planned idea and all its intricacies leave her head as her husband looks at her. Once again, Pansy is the centre of attention in a room where all eyes rest on her as they wait for her to speak – she feels more ill here than she did in the council rooms previously. "No," she eventually gets out, "I haven't heard anything of the General. But it is only a matter of time."

Oliver eyes her as if considering sending her away. Thankfully, he stays silent.

"And once General Weasley's death is announced, his followers will turn to you as their new leader."

"I do not have to accept the role," he notes.

Cho steps forward. There's a shiver to her shoulders that is missing from Pansy, more practiced, better suited to standing before people who may hate her and saying her piece. But, despite the shake in Cho's voice when she speaks, she sounds stern. "That will be of little consequence if everyone in Paris still believes you are their leader, in only name or otherwise." Pansy sees the way her friend's hand clenches and unclenches from a fist – she moves and takes it in hers. This time, Cho's words have no quiver to them. "We are here to offer you help, a safe way to escape the city before anything happens to the General. Do not scoff at us."

The room erupts into shouts. More than one person points out 'They are Catholics!', another tossing out 'How do we know this isn't a trap?' and even more 'They could have been sent here to spy on us!'

In any other room, with any other men, a simple look from Pansy would silence it once more, even if the King sat amongst the crowd. But here, Pansy has to make herself heard.

Even Cho looks shocked when Pansy shouts, "Hey!" It takes longer than she would like, but after a scattering of seconds, all the attention is back on Pansy and the room has fallen quiet again. "Arguing isn't going to help any of us. Yes, we _are_ Catholics, and you may think what you wish about us because of that fact. But as it is, we are your only allies in this. And I know what this city will do at the first hint of dissent."

Oliver doesn't look happy but he nods at his wife's words.

"I cannot make you trust me wholly, but I am asking you to trust that I do not want anyone to die; whether that is you or anyone else. Whatever this marriage may be, I do not wish you to die because of it." Pansy doesn't blink, holding his gaze to make sure he understands. In front of her, Oliver seems to soften, ever so slightly.

He admits, "I trusted your brother, Persimmon."

"Well, he is not here," she snaps back. "And I apologise that I am not he, sir. For you, and for everyone else in France, I wish I could be, but sadly I was born the wrong sex, and with Salic Law as well I have neither the balls nor the right to even try and mimic him on the throne." Once more Oliver nods but his face is expressionless.

The room is quiet.

It is Cedric who steps forward, moving away from his spot leaning against the wall and stepping closer to Cho. He doesn't reach for her but Pansy catches the way his hand seems to consider it before backtracking and falling by his side.

"You say you can get us out of the city?" He directs it at Pansy but doesn't take his eyes off Cho.

Someone in the crowd exclaims, "They could be leading us into a trap!"

Pansy tries to find the owner of the voice but they are silent before she can properly look.

Cedric releases a laugh. He shakes his head, addressing the rest of the room as he states, "They gain nothing by offering – we haven't said we will accept. Even if it is a trap, which I for one doubt it is, they are revealing their hand to us."

Oliver sniffs and everyone in the room seems to know that it is a noise of confirmation, agreeing with his cousin. Pansy blinks. "Let us hear your plan then, your Majesty."

 

+

 

Before she leaves Oliver asks her, "Will you come with me?"

Only one person in the room doesn't wait for her answer, reminding everyone else, "She is a _Catholic_ ,she can't be trusted."

Pansy ignores it. "No." Oliver drops his eyes from her face. "I can't. It would only cause more trouble for you." She pauses, waits for his eyes to come back to hers. They don't. She continues, "They would send soldiers to fetch me back the second they realise I am gone. I wouldn't put people needlessly at risk."

"I understand."

"I could follow. When things have settled down."

That earns her Oliver's full gaze and attention. "Would you?"

 

+

 

Weak from lack of sleep – she woke too many times to count from a reoccurring dream that General Weasley had died and the city was all fire, blood and chaos – and pale in the early morning light, Pansy is still being dressed, Cho at her back, tightening the ribbons of her corset, when Lady Malfoy arrives unannounced into Pansy's rooms.

She tries her best to hide her surprise.

"His Majesty wishes to see you."

And Pansy immediately knows they know. Luckily she cannot become any paler, so her initial reaction of fear goes unnoticed.

"Once you are dressed, he will be waiting for you," and with that Lady Malfoy leaves as quickly as she entered.

This time, Pansy refuses when Cho offers to come with her. "It is me he has summoned, not you." But Cho looks desperate, clutching at Pansy's hands like if she lets her go, she won't see her again. Pansy doesn't want to release her either, but there are better uses of Cho's time than following her to face the council. "Do not worry," she says, unsure if she's saying it for Cho or for herself, "I can handle myself."

Cho tries, "Pan-"

"Go and find Cedric. Tell him. . . tell him the plan may have changed. Don't worry, everything will be fine."

Cho's face suggests she doesn't believe Pansy's words but she manages to show Pansy a watery smile before loosening the tightness of her grip.

"I'll come find you," Pansy tells her, even though she has no idea how long the council and Posey are going to keep her, or if she will have free reign of the palace grounds after she see them, but Cho doesn't make a comment on it.

Posey's rooms are always colder than the rest of the palace, at least according to Pansy's knowledge. The coolness of the air sends a ripple down her back as she enters but Pansy grits her teeth through it, entering the room with her face steeled to expressionless.

Posey beams at the sight of her.

The rest of the room is less excited to see her. 

Lady Black-Lestrange is the first to speak. "I hear you have a wonderful view of our lawns from your rooms," she comments. There is a smile on her face but Pansy knows she is revealing her teeth as a sign of power, not as a sign of pleasantness.

"I hear the people singing, but I don't recognise any of their songs," Pansy counters.

Next to his son, Lord Malfoy scoffs. "Don't be petulant, your Majesty. You know why you have been called here."

Pansy looks at Draco, trying to make him look at her – once upon a time, they were friends and Pansy adored him; but that was too long ago and now, despite his wife's position as one of Pansy's ladies, Pansy can barely call their interactions civil, let alone claim that they are friends anymore – but he avoids her eyes, carefully focusing anywhere else in the room than at her.

With a sigh, she admits, "I don't, actually. I was still dressing when I was summoned."

Posey laughs as if his sister has told the funniest joke in the world. "Why is everyone so serious today?" he asks, then waits like he is expecting an acceptable answer. "We are all friends here, are we not?"

"Are we?" Pansy counters.

The King sighs. "Yes, we are. We all are." He puts too much emphasis on his words for Pansy to believe them, to think _he_ even believes them. "And we all want the same thing."

"Of course we do, your Majesty," Lady Malfoy simpers. Pansy feels her lip furl as she looks at the woman. Of the two remaining Black sisters in the palace, Lady Malfoy is the most like Madame Tonks, at least in softness of nature and motherly qualities. But there is a wall there as well where there wasn't with her father's mistress, a sort of falseness to her nature as if Lady Malfoy knows how she should act around children but hasn't properly mastered it. Of course, Posey misses this, and he always smiles at her whenever she addresses him. "We all just want what is best for France, for this city."

Pansy refrains from rolling her eyes when Posey smiles now at Lady Malfoy, but it is a near thing.

"Exactly," Lady Black-Lestrange agrees. "Which is why we must all trust one another." She scans her eyes over Pansy as she stands. "We must _all_ trust one another."

"Are you saying you can't trust _me_ , Milady?"

This only causes Lady Black-Lestrange to rise out from her chair, her black cloak rising with her like the huge, imposing wings of an angry bird. Pansy refuses to show her fear. Luckily, Posey is still the King and when he shouts, "Calm yourselves, no one is saying that. There is no one here who cannot trust you, Pansy, no one," everyone quiets down. Pansy moves her eyes from Lady Black-Lestrange to her brother. "But- there is the slight matter of your husband."

"Who I married because you asked me to."

Pansy no longer cares if she cuts across the King to make her point heard. Lord Malfoy has already accused her of petulance before everyone else in the room, there is nothing to lose by continuing to be so.

"Yes," and Posey manages to sound like he agrees. "But when I asked you, we believed it was for the best. Now we have protestors and Protestant supporters chanting prayers and yelling for their General. _And_ your husband."

"Oliver did not ask them to come."

"They are still on our lawn!"

Pansy grips the sides of her skirts tightly. "Then speak to them. Appease them. Tell them we are working on finding the General's would-be assassin. If they hear anything, they may disperse themselves." Once she finishes speaking, she locks her jaw in place, gritting her teeth again. Pain shoots up into her ear from the force of her muscles but Pansy doesn't let go. She feels ready to snap. "As long as we tell them he is still alive, they will be satisfied."

No one in the room looks satisfied with her words. And Pansy knows straight away not one of them wants to tell the Protestants banging at the doors that they are looking for the person who shot General Weasley- she had had her suspicions that some members of the council had a hand in the shooting since she had heard of it but when the knowledge becomes clear, Pansy only finds herself more angry.

"But when he dies, what then?" Lord Malfoy, all silver hair and a cane Pansy has seen him strike someone so hard with it he shattered bone, takes a huge step towards her, gesturing widely with his arm, and asks, "When they start looking for your husband to lead them, then what will we tell them to calm them?"

Pansy opens her mouth but only a croak comes out.

"He could convert," someone says, but when Draco repeats it he changes a word:

"He must convert."

As hard as she tries, Pansy can't hold it in. "The whole point of our marriage was to unite the religions. What would it say if one of us were to convert so quickly?" She knows she shouldn't be arguing this hard. Her hold on Posey is tentative enough as it is without her appearing crazed and siding with the Protestants. She knows as soon as she leaves the room, the council will be spinning stories in her brother's ears. And while he would never execute her, she knows this, she trusts this fact, Pansy also knows he would not hesitate to get rid of her. Or worse – the council could take the opportunity into their own hands and have her murdered, removing her from the situation entirely. "It has only been a few days. He can't convert now."

Lord Malfoy sneers, "You sound as if you care."

Pansy looks to her brother. He sits in front of her in gold and green, shining as a king should; he is nothing of the crying, begging boy from the previous night. She has to close her eyes.

"I don't want anyone to act rashly and for it end in chaos for all of us," she says.

At the table, Lady Black-Lestrange looks to her sister, then clucks her tongue off her teeth. It gets Pansy's attention. "We will do as the Princess advises – his Majesty will address the crowds outside and let them know General Weasley is alive and well, and that we are doing all within our power to find his shooter. And, for now, we will refrain from converting anyone until we receive more news."

Pansy swallows down the lump that takes over her throat when Lady Black-Lestrange smiles at her, wolfish and too many teeth.

 

+

 

After Posey speaks to the people, things seem to settle in the Louvre.

That night, the King comes to his sister's rooms and plays cards with his friends and her ladies until the candles burn low in their holders and the light fades down to orange. Pansy sits across the room, watching Oliver sitting with the other men, and tries to ignore the nagging feeling in her gut that something is going to go wrong.

It doesn't- at least, not yet.

For four days and nights Pansy waits for some terrible news. She goes to bed each night after kissing Pine's cheek and sending him off with his nurse and finds herself unable to sleep. When she does manage to, she dreams of Persimmon, of Fontainebleau and the cries of his horse when it fell, like some horrid omen hanging over her. And in the morning, Pansy rushes through dressing, dreading the knock at her door and a voice summoning her before King and council.

Oliver remains in Paris, locked in by a stalemate at the palace.

Despite this, this peace their wedding was meant to bring and the calmness of the court, Blaise still says his man can be ready within an hour, as long as they get word to him quickly. He means well when he says it, the two of them walking through the rose garden together, but it does little to settle the nervous feeling in Pansy's stomach.

All she can do is thank him and wait for the calm before the storm to pass, busying herself amid her ladies as the rest of the King's friends and confidants play games til all hours in her rooms.

Tonight, after he loses yet another hand to the King, Oliver rises up from the table with an excuse on his lips and walks across the room to where Pansy, Cho and Millicent sit.

Pansy's nose is in her book. Her eyes are straining to read the text in the dimming light, but that has yet to make her put it down. It is Cho he asks if he may sit down and it is once he is seated Pansy lowers the book and addresses him.

"Tired of losing your money to my brother?" she asks, a hint of a laugh in her voice.

Oliver's smile is a crooked slant across his face. "He is a cardsharp if ever I met one," he acquiesces.

"I taught him everything he knows."

"And yet you don't play with us?"

Pansy considers her answer. If she answers honestly, she may reveal a side of herself she isn't ready to admit to Oliver yet; if she answers with a lie, it could come out too harshly and Oliver may walk away and she feels foolish enough thinking it, but there's something in the fact that he came over to her, made contact himself tonight that makes her want to keep him over here for as long as she can. She goes with, "It is improper to not let a king win and I hate to lose, so what can I do?"

Oliver laughs. A bright sound that has a smile on Pansy's face in an instant.

He stays by his wife's side for the rest of the evening.

 

+

 

In the morning, news of General Weasley's worsening condition spreads around the palace before breakfast has been served. When it does arrive, Pansy doesn't eat, just waits. And waits. And waits to be told the General has died.

 

+

 

The room is silent. No one moves, not one of Pansy's ladies, while she sits at the table shuffling and reshuffling the pack of cards. Millicent sits by the bookshelf – more than once Pansy has looked over at her and watched her think about reading one of the books, but always stops herself. Pansy has not told them to be quiet, but not one of them tries to start any conversation. The flick of the cards in Pansy's hands is obnoxiously loud amid the stillness.

The banging at the door startles them all.

It is low on the wood and Pansy already knows who it is by the placement of it; she motions at Astoria to sit, getting up to answer it herself instead.

Pine practically trips over his own legs, falling in on top of Pansy as his form of entry. His nurse stumbles in behind him, apologies already on her lips for his intrusion but Pansy guides her towards a seat as best she can with Pine swinging from her dress before the old woman can get them out fully.

"They're going to kill them."

Pansy mishears it the first time he says it, his little voice pushed into her and heavily muffled. She teeters backwards, trying to keep them both up, but also trying to make Pine lift his head so she can hear him better. Luckily, he repeats it, his voice watery with it as he says, "They guards have been sent out to kill them."

"Kill who?"

One of her ladies – from her spot in the room, Pansy figures it is Astoria – gasps at the words.

Looking to her brother's nurse, Pansy asks again, "Kill who? What is happening?"

As if they have heard their conversation, the sound of horses galloping out of the courtyard comes up to the window from below. Pine's nurse pales, "General Weasley died an hour ago, your Majesty." She gestures at Pine and Pansy strokes the back of his head protectively, brushing her fingers through his sweaty curls. "And Pine, he says- he overheard the council speaking with the King."

"Posey said they would blame him."

Pansy can't say she wants either of them to continue, but she finds herself saying, "What has Posey done, Pine? Tell me what is going on, I'll go and talk to him once I know, I'll see-"

"You can't!" and he's screaming, his face red with it. "Posey said that there is too many of them in the city, that they all came for your wedding and now that their General is dead, he has to get rid of them all." Most of his words are cried into her dress but Pansy understands well enough. "He said they would all blame him for General Weasley's death, but if he got rid of them all, they couldn't."

" _Shit_." Pansy can't breathe. She can't breathe and she can't hold up Pine any longer; she has to let them both topple to the ground, her knees buckling under her. "You swear this is what you heard?" she pushes out although there is little reason to – Pine has never been a liar and the sounds of men's shouts, the clatter of armour and weaponry attest to her brother's story. He squeaks out a noise into her. All she can do is pet his hair, until his weight becomes too much for her and she calls his nurse over to help him get him standing again.

Her ladies are upon her in a flash once Pine has been taken away, now settled against his nurse. In the middle of the fussing and chaos, Pansy tells Cho, "Find them and warn them," and Cho is gone in a second, disappearing from the room with the message. 

 

+

 

Pine has barely settled when Daphne bursts into Pansy's rooms, her makeup tear streaked and her face pink around the nose and cheeks from crying. Before she can speak, Pansy slips herself into the space between Daphne and Pine, shielding him from the sight of her anxious and pale. "He never came," she gasps out, and her breast heave within her bodice.

A look from Pansy and Astoria is on her sister in a heartbeat, pulling her in and instructing her, "Calm down, it's alright, it's alright," as she steers her towards a seat at the back of the room, away from the others. Pine looks up at the words, eyes away from the book open on his nurse's lap – he seems to settle when Astoria repeats them and even in a moment like this, Pansy finds herself smiling to know those words calm him, even when they don't come from her.

But Daphne doesn't calm. And her voice is loud, carrying easily through the rest of the room to the others. "I overheard guards talking. I know what they are doing tonight, and Oliver counts as one of them."

"Daphne." Pansy's voice is an order.

"You can't let him die," she counters.

Pansy feels ill. She supposes, considering everything else, that it is only right that she should feel slightly uneasy discuss the possibility of her husband dying with his frantic mistress, but it feels heavier than that.

Daphne pleads, "You have to find him."

Millicent is the first up and out of her chair, already moving to block Pansy from the door before Pansy has even thought it through fully. "Your Majesty, you cannot go out in that." Daphne wails but Millicent just throws her a disapproving look. "Even for your husband, it would be foolish and dangerous." Loudly, she continues, "And who is to say he isn't as we are, barricaded in a room for protection."

But Daphne is insistent. "He always comes when I say."

Pansy swallows down the thick lump in her throat. It tastes like disgust but sharper.

"Daphne, stop it at once." Even Pansy jolts at Millicent's tone. "Her Majesty will not throw herself into danger for the sake of your lover." Daphne sobs again, wet and horrid. Pansy watches Millicent's face turn into a grimace but her shoulders sag, as if she is sighing. "If it is so important to you that we go," she goes on, "then _we_ may look for him."

Pansy is already shaking her head when she exclaims, "Millicent!"

Her face is soft when she turns to Pansy. Soft and ever so lightly smiling. She explains, "We are not Princesses of France, your Majesty. The people need you to stay alive."

Pansy wants to fight her. She can't let her ladies go out in the carnage outside. She has already stupidly sent Cho out and it has been over an hour since she left, no sight or sound of her since. Now Millicent is volunteering the rest of them as well. Pansy places a hand flat on her bodice to steady herself, then says, "I can't ask you to do that."

Standing up, Astoria looks more certain and assured than Pansy thinks she has ever felt in her own life. "They aren't looking for ladies – most of the guests who came for your wedding were men."

Pansy doesn't want them to go.

"We will be back." Turning to her sister, Astoria sticks out her hand and calls out, "Come along, Daphne. You would know where he would be better than I would."

Daphne just sniffs, snotty and disgusting. Pansy wants to reach out to her, brush her red hair away from her neck and apologise for this, for everything; for marrying her lover and for it all ending up like this. But she doesn't look at Pansy as she passes, ignoring her sister's hand as well and going straight to the door.

Millicent still stands facing Pansy. "Be safe," is all Pansy can offer her.

"If I see Cho, I will send her back. Lock the door behind me."

 

+

 

They're gone for what feels like hours. They're gone so long that Pine falls asleep on his chair, curled in against his nurse, and Pansy is left pacing the room, over and over, until there's a bang at the wall.

It is distinctly a bang, not a knock. And it is most definitely not the door but the wall.

Pine's nurse reaches to stop Pansy from going out to check but her hand is already on the door. There are shouts, the creak of the wood as she pulls the door open. It is Oliver who hits her full force, as guards on the stairs yell his name; Pansy leaves him fall to the floor, not fully sure how she stays calm and standing herself, but somehow she manages to catch the scabbard of the sword swung at Oliver. She digs her nails in, just to make sure the guard doesn't try to push more.

"Your Majesty," he exclaims. "We are under orders from the King."

"I don't care," Pansy argues. From the floor Oliver groans. She can't bring herself to look at him, not yet, not when the guards in front of her may still force her out of the way. "That man is my husband and you will not touch him. He is with me." The words bark out of her. Again, the guard tries, calling her 'Majesty' but Pansy shoves him backwards with, "I am a Princess of France, you will not force your way past me."

Another one moves, shouting out, "He is a Protestant, the King has ordered it! He must die!"

She dares them, "Kill me first, if you must. Then go and see if the King's orders still stand."

The guard before her opens his mouth to reply, Pansy's brain already planning what she will say to silence him, when Cho rushes in from the other stairs, a dagger in her hand and six armed men and Millicent with her, surprising every guard in Pansy's doorway. "You lay a finger on the Princess just to get to an injured man and I will stab you in the heart," Cho says, all fire and anger. The sword in Pansy's hand is lowered, Pansy's hands falling away, but Cho's dagger remains pointed firm as she stands unblinking, breath heaving. "Get away from the door."

Pansy's heart feels as though it may beat right out of her chest.

"Let's go," the guard relents, retreating from Pansy's door.

They leave without a scuffle, the weapons pointed on them by Cho, Millicent and their men enough of a deterrent. But Pansy doesn't watch them go, too busy lifting Oliver off the floor as much as she can to pay attention to the sound of the guards leaving and the accompanying clicks of rifles cocking at them. Two steps and Cho is beside her – their faces touch for a moment, nothing more, but Cho knows Pansy is thankful to see her – helping her shift Oliver. 

To Millicent, Pansy instructs, "Get these men out of here."

 

+

 

Oliver is heavier than Pansy had realised before, but together with Cho – and Pine opening the door to Pansy's bedroom for them – they get him settled on her bed. He groans and tries to turn over, but ends up hissing and stopping, falling back flat onto the sheets. He's covered in blood, shirt stained, stinking and torn. "Nurse," Pansy calls out, immediately working on getting Oliver's shirt off him, to better see the wounds underneath. " _Nurse_!"

She enters with Millicent, whose dagger is now tucked at her side. "Fetch water and cloth. He needs to be cleaned."

It is a struggle to get him undressed. First his clothes cling to him with blood, then his wounds leak onto the sheets and make them stick to his skin. One particularly nasty slice at his side wets Pansy's palm, soaking into her sleeves and dyeing them red – Oliver spits out a pained sound, his hand lifting from where it had been twisting in the sheets to grab at Pansy's wrist. He smudges more blood onto her. Pansy's skin turns to gooseflesh.

"He needs a doctor," Millicent decrees, watching Pansy futilely washing the blood from the same spot again and again.

"We can't fetch the King's doctors!"

Pine's nurse speaks up from her corner of the bed where she holds Oliver's shoulder in place so he won't thrash as Pansy touches him. "I know a man – he's a physician, on Grenville. He used to be a hangman, but he is capable."

Pansy feels Oliver's shudder at the word 'hangman'. Her hand soothing along his flank seems to settle him.

"Can he be trusted?" she asks.

"I'd trust him with my life," the nurse urges.

"Then fetch him," Pansy agrees with a nod. "Fetch him and on your return get Blaise. We will need his associate if we are to keep him safe."

Millicent sees the nurse to the door then stops to check on Pine, who has slept through everything. It leaves Pansy alone with Cho, Oliver too delirious and hurt on the bed to really pay them any mind. Pansy is washing out a sodden cloth when Cho approaches her.

"He is in no state to travel," Cho says and it sounds like a warning.

"We have no other option," Pansy declares. "If he is here in the morning, there is no telling what they will do with him. I don't care if he is held together by string and a prayer, he is leaving at dawn tomorrow."

Oliver makes a noise from the bed.

"You know I am right," and that ends the argument. She asks, "Did you find Cedric earlier?"

It seems to soften Cho, if only a little. "Yes. He is safe. Those were his men with me when we found you."

Pansy squeezes out the cloth and the water turns light red. There's blood caking under her fingernails. Her sleeves are dense, heavily coloured with it, her skirts stained too from where Oliver fell on her. And yet, despite of it all, she smiles at her friend's words. "Do you know where he is now? Could you get to him safely?" Cho merely nods. "Then go to him now. Tell him they are leaving in the morning. At dawn. And that Oliver may need some help."

" _May_?"

"Don't dishearten him with the truth. He shall see for himself tomorrow but for now, it doesn't matter."

 

+

 

The doctor washes his hands. The bowl he uses is filled with more blood than water at this point but he is finally finished with Oliver, who lies sweaty faced but clean on Pansy's bed. Her sheets are destroyed, blood soaking through and turning brown, streaked to the farthest corners by Oliver's hands when they skittered out, looking for something to grab to counter the pain of being stitched back together. There are tears in a few spots as well, from Oliver's grip becoming too tight and yanking. But now he lies still, his chest rising and falling with every breath, and Pansy wipes a clean, damp cloth across his brow.

"Thank you," she says, addressing the doctor but looking at her husband.

As he passes, the doctor places a hand on her shoulder, a silent 'you're welcome' placed with it. Pansy feels the slick of his hand press into her skin; since there is already blood all over her she cares little if the doctor adds more.

From the door, he tells her, "Make sure he drinks," and with that, he leaves.

The door shuts and Pansy moves to fetch some water, but Oliver's hand reaches for her before she is even off the bed. He hisses, obviously straining himself, but doesn't pull his arm back. "Wait," he requests, voice cry-broken and soft. "Stay a while longer."

"You heard the doctor," she tries, but finds herself sitting on the bed regardless.

"The water will still be there in a moment, just. . . stay."

Pansy resituates herself while trying her best not to shake Oliver. His breathing stays even. And he doesn't let go of her. For a second, she considers giving him her hand properly to hold but the thought feels too much and she remains still; instead, she distracts herself with patting at his face with the cloth. He hums as she wipes it along his nose.

"I never-" he begins but doesn't take it further. Pansy gives him her attention. He draws his fingers up her wrist, over the crest of the bone and back down onto her flesh. "You saved my life tonight. I-" again, he stops himself going any further.

Pansy waits.

"You grabbed a sword to protect me." He sounds shocked to admit it. As Pansy remembers it, Oliver was face down and groaning into the floor when she had stopped the guard, unable to see her, but from his words and from his face he must have, yet cannot believe what he saw.

He shifts closer to her, his mouth open as if ready to speak more, but Pansy hushes him silent with a gentle shushing noise. She brushes her hand upwards over his face with the cloth, letting her thumb stroke over his skin. Oliver's eyes flutter closed. His eyelashes are so long. Pansy's thumb passes over his cheek, barely under where they rest. She tells him, "We all do things without thinking when we have to. Jump without looking."

Oliver tilts his face towards her. The movement forces her hand along him, fingertips now in his hair as she cups his neck. His skin is warm beneath her palm. "I couldn't watch you die," leaning in as she confesses, hardly a note above a whisper, barely there. It feels too honest, as if she has revealed too much of herself in that breath, even though it is Oliver who lies naked and stitched back together in her bed. But her attempt to steal back some of herself is flawed, when she says: "Even if we are merely a political inconvenience, I still have no desire to become a widow so early into our marriage." She doesn't laugh although her words suggest she should.

Her husband eyes her.

And Pansy remembers too late that it wasn't _her_ he shared those words with before.

When she moves this time, Oliver lets her go. Her wrist feels hot where his hand was before and Pansy feels rattled. As she pours fresh water from the jug into a cup, she worries she is going to drop them both, her hands too weak to hold them; as if the weight of them could break right through all her bones, suddenly too delicate to support anything.

Somehow she makes it back to the bed in one solid piece with the cup intact.

She has Oliver lean on her as she makes him drink. The cup bumps his teeth only once but he manages to drink, Pansy keeping his head supported even as she continues to feel weak and strange; sitting behind him conceals it from Oliver better than before.

A cough is the only notice she gets that he is going to bring the water back up. Pansy just holds his head, removing the cup from his mouth, and lets him splutter it up. Water sloshes over her fingers where she cups his jaw delicately but she doesn't take her hand away. He finds the cloth in the sheets and pats at her hand with it – she keeps a tremble at bay but only just.

"Thank you," she says.

The cloth hits the floor with a soggy thwap.

He has to tilt his head backwards to look at her. She carefully moves with him, avoiding straining him. Oliver sighs. Then says, "You have done this before," lilting it like a question.

The answer comes out of her easily. "For Persimmon."

He asks, "What happened to him?" Oliver asks her, "What happened to him?" and Pansy can't tell if he is asking for her or to know. She can't tell if he is asking because he doesn't know the story or if he wants to hear her say it. And from this, she can't decide which one hurts more. Persimmon was Dauphin of France when he died, the great and wonderful heir to their father's throne – Pansy remembers the waves upon waves of people, covered head to toe in black at his funeral, the black banners hanging in the basilica and the fleur de lis on top of Persimmon's coffin. 

She must shake because Oliver's hand finds hers.

"His horse collapsed. And he wasn't quick enough to jump off – the poor creature fell on him." She has to take a breath. Oliver squeezes her fingers with his. "His legs were crushed. His back was damaged as well. He couldn't move; it took four men to get him inside."

"How long-"

"Sixteen days," she cries, waterier than she means for it to be. Somehow she keeps it soft, despite every part of her wanting to sob for her brother, as loudly and dramatically as Persimmon deserves her mourning to be. She speaks so softly. "The doctors tried attaching rods to his legs but they were too badly destroyed. They kept assuring us he was getting better, kept trying to get me to leave the room, that I was only upsetting myself staying and my brother needed quiet to recover. But I couldn't leave him." Oliver clasps her hand tightly, stroking his thumb along her knuckles. Pansy wants to snatch her hand away but can't bring herself to move. His grip grows tighter still. "In the end, he sent everyone else away. The doctors were repeating that he was wrong, that he was only going to make himself ill if they weren't present, but he sent them out of the room."

Oliver asks, "Was it only you?"

Pansy's lips curve into a smile like the thought is a happy one. "No." And again, less sharply, "No." She sniffs as a tear moves down her face. "Blaise was there too."

She feels him kiss her hand.

It takes a twist and a shake of her head to resettle herself. Pansy sits her straighter once more and reaches for the cup. It is more difficult from this angle, but Oliver has yet to release her hand. He takes the water better this time.

"There," she sighs. She is not yet fully right but Pansy refuses to let go of herself again.

Oliver has to give her back her hand. And Pansy moves to sit in the chair at the end of the bed.

 

+

 

Oliver snores when he sleeps. Pansy doesn't mean to stay awake listening to him, the breathy exhales he pushes out from his nose, she really doesn't, but she finds herself listening to it instead of sleeping. It's disgustingly soothing, even amid everything else in the room.

For the night Pansy listens to Oliver snore and watches the candles burn down to nothing.

By the time the morning is beginning to break and Cho is knocking on the door, letting herself in when Pansy doesn't answer, Pansy hasn't slept a second. "Cedr-" she starts but stops at the sight of Pansy. She gives Cho a smile but it doesn't take away the frown on Cho's face. "Majesty, are you alright?" Pansy attempts to brush it off, shaking her head and turning to focus on Oliver waking up. "You look grey."

"It is just the blood." Cho looks disgusted. Pansy watches as Oliver clenches a hand over his side, as if holding his own stitches together as he sits up. Pansy inhales, then reassures, "I have so much of it on my clothes, it is difficult to tell I have any of my own within me."

Cho doesn't look convinced but she knows better than to press further.

She says what she came in to say, "Cedric is here."

 

+

 

Pansy sees them first. The whole group stop when she does, and the movement causes Oliver to groan in pain against Cedric's side. She looks back between the approaching guards, the dead bodies they are carting with them, and Cho's face beside her twice before she speaks. "Go with them, take them to the servants' stables."

Cho looks past Pansy to the approaching guard. Pansy knows she is going to argue but they don't have time for it.

She tells her, "Go. Now. That is an order. Go and don't stop. Get them out of the city."

"Majesty, I can't-"

"Yes, you can. I can delay the guards, but you must go now."

Cho hates the plan; it is written all over her face. But Pansy takes a step away from her, turning to Cedric, Oliver's face sweaty and pale as it leans against his shoulder, and instructs, "Cho will get you out of here; I am trusting you to take care of her in return for me."

Despite the moment, with the sound of the guards coming, Cedric laughs. "For you, your Majesty, anything."

Pansy smiles in spite of herself. "Good." She says, "Keep him alive too," and then she is gone, coming around the corner to the guards. They stop at her approach and an arm of a corpse flops to the ground, fingertips brushing the stone. The stench of blood and death is everywhere but Pansy is covered in enough of Oliver's blood that she is used to it now. She doesn't look back, can't look back, and it's somewhere in the middle of that and the fact that the guards are holding _dead bodies_ with them that makes the first tear fall down her cheek.

Once she starts, she cannot stop.

A body slips to the floor as a guard reaches for her. She does her best to struggle away from him but Pansy is suddenly taken by a tremble and it makes her easier to catch.

"What have you done?" she sobs, the words thick and heavy in her throat. "What have you _done_?"

"Majesty," one to her right tries. Pansy doesn't look at him, just cries and cries, lifting her free arm to wipe at her tears with the back of her hand. She knows it leaves bloody marks across her face when spots on her hand come away clean and wet. "You shouldn't be here."

"What have you done?" she repeats, louder this time. "What have you all done? They are dead."

Two of the guards step away from the group and along with the guard who already holds her, they start leading her away, towards her rooms, back the way she had just come with the others. There is no sign of them in the corridors as they walk and Pansy breathes in and out at this, praying they are safely away. Her breath hiccups in her throat.

She manages to get her arm away from the guard on the stairs and he leaves her be, obviously assuming she is beginning to calm down. But when they are found coming out into the hallway before Pansy's bedroom by Lady Black-Lestrange and the King, Pansy wails again and throws herself at her brother. He looks at her, horrified at the sight of her – her hands and arms are stained with Oliver's blood, her skirts and sleeves and face too. Pansy grabs at him as he tries to step back.

"How could you let this happen?" she begs. Only half of it, perhaps even less, is an act. "How could you have allowed this?"

"Your Majesty," someone attempts but Pansy moves quickly, pushing at Posey so he has to step backwards.

She can barely catch her breath around her sobs and it is a struggle to get out the line, "You have cursed us all with this, our family name. . . we are all damned with what you have done."

Lady Black-Lestrange orders, "Get her off him. Get her into her rooms," her voice a terrible screech.

Pansy lets them pull her away this time, lets her fingers get torn away from Posey's clothes and lets them all but carry her to the door of her rooms, her whole body violently shaking. If she passes out amid all of this, she doesn't realise until she wakes up, stripped of her bloody clothes and lying in clean sheets on her bed.  
  
  
  
  
  


\+ + + 

 

 

 

 

**i i i .  A C T  T H R E E :  a  m u r d e r**  


 

Pau is colder than Paris.

By the time their travelling party reaches Aquitaine, September is properly in the air and Oliver's stitches have mostly healed.

No one has yet to come after them and even with Cedric's promises that they wouldn't dare come for them, not here, not now, Oliver can't rid himself of the need to constantly check over his shoulder. He wakes one night from a dream, swearing he hears horses riding down the streets for them, but Cedric hushes him quiet again and fetches his cousin a cup of water.

Pansy's first letter arrives after a fortnight.

Oliver traces his thumb across her personal seal, looping over the floral entwined P before cracking it in half. Cho waits while he reads, purposely making a show of _not_ reading over his shoulder. Oliver hadn't been expecting his wife's handwriting to be so small and neat. It slants ever so slightly to the left, forcing him to turn the page to read it more easily. In it, she says that everything is well. Paris has settled back down after the killings, most voices claiming it a good thing, praising the King for preventing an imminent Protestant coup on the city; Posey and the Spanish King are in talks to marry Primrose to the Prince; Pine has been struggling with a cough and climbing into Pansy's bed every night, sweating and coughing, but so far she hasn't caught anything from him.

Other than that one comment, Pansy doesn't mention herself at all.

"Is she well?" Cho presses.

"I couldn't say."

She declines when he tries to pass her the letter, so she may read it herself and see if she can gain any information from it that he cannot. "No," she insists, folding it back into his hand. "She wrote to you. I'm sure I will receive one if she wishes me to know how she is."

Oliver frowns at the paper.

"She doesn't say if she is well."

"Take it as a good thing," Cho states, "for I am sure if anything were wrong, she would try and tell you."

It doesn't make Oliver feel any better. Cho laughs at his furrowed brow. "If you are so worried, sir, write back to her." Oliver puts the letter down and this time when she speaks, Cho's voice is softer. "It is alright if you are – I hear husbands are allowed to worry for their wives."

Oliver really doesn't believe he has any right to feel this way at all.

For nearly two months is goes like this: Pansy writes, Oliver replies, Pansy writes again. On and on, the circle continues and somehow, Oliver feels like he is learning both more and less about his wife with every letter between them. There is a disconnect between them.

For every letter Pansy sends, Oliver finds it harder and harder to put Pansy together in his head. With every new piece of her he receives, the less she fits together as the image of Pansy of Valois he had previously known. She is too soft with Pine, letting him away with things Oliver couldn't imagine her letting others away with; palace politics seem to bore her more and more with each passing week yet she always has something to say about them; she states more than once in various letters she misses Cho, that Millicent is good company but when she is the only company she has, she misses Cho. And in ways, she seems to miss him also.

None of these parts belong with the _Pansy_ Oliver knew before.

Even on that evening, when Oliver lay getting stitched back together on her bed as she wiped blood and sweat off him, when Pansy had plotted to get Oliver safely out of the city then almost wept over Persimmon, Oliver had spaces for those parts of her to fit into; the pragmatic princess and the mourning sister. They didn't correspond very well, especially with happening so closely together, but Oliver was able to make sense of them.

All of these new parts of Pansy confound him. He just can't piece her together properly. 

But, worst of all, he misses her. Oliver genuinely misses her. He misses her being close. Even in their tangled, messed up relationship, with its frightening amount of death and blood but very little friendship, he misses her. Oliver misses Pansy and he can't help but worry about her without him with her in Paris.

It all feels so much more than he is allowed to feel. But he never mentions it to Cho again.

 

+

 

By the time the letter comes October has settled in; snow has begun to fall throughout the city, bleeding down from the mountains, but every night is disappears, leaving behind a dangerous layer of frost over the paths and streets. Oliver's last letter to Pansy was sent over a week ago, a response due, but when the messenger enters the room with the paper in his hand, Oliver immediately knows this is not from his wife.

The seal is blue – the King's seal with the King's personal stamp upon it, a P like his sister's but much less flowery.

Oliver cracks it.

He has to read it three times before he can begin to put together the words in front of him.

It is all but a summons back to Paris. In between the King's words about his sister's upcoming marriage and how Oliver is _cordially invited_ to join them and that Madame Tonks is even returning from England for the celebration, Oliver can feel the threat of what may happen if he does not attend. There is no space in Posey's words for Oliver to decline; nowhere does he offer any way out.

They must go. . . 

At least for _her_.

 

+

 

Paris is a flush of colour – ribbons of every colour adorn the streets, hanging from people's windows, while flowers, out of season for France but shipped in from any city that can supply them, sit on windowsills and in huge pots at every street corner. There was no such ceremony and excitement like this around the city when Oliver married Pansy and Oliver feels marginally guilty he didn't cause such a fuss about it.

He steers his horse into the grand courtyard and sees the multiple fleur de lis banners flying from every balcony available. He always knew but now, with all of it staring him plainly in the face, Oliver realises just how much of a ridiculous, political joke his marriage was then.

 

+

 

There is no one in Pansy's rooms when he enters.

Signs of life are everywhere – a dress thrown over a chair, worn and wrinkled from not being put away properly; makeup across the table, powder spilled from the golden jar it sits in and yet to be cleaned up; books out of place on the shelves, and cards left on the table in a half finished game – but they are silent. Oliver lets his attention drift to a chair, remembering Pansy sitting in it more than once; laughing with Cho, quietly reading to herself, or smiling in delight at the court magician's latest sleight of hand. His face turns to a smile at the memory of hers.

The door opens with a click.

"Oliver," says a voice and then there is someone next to him, spinning him to face them and wrapping their arms around him.

Lips kiss his cheek.

The hair is the wrong colour for Pansy.

"Daphne."

He hasn't spoken to her in months. She is warm in his arms and like a reflex, as her hands cup his neck, to tilt his face to properly kiss his mouth, he kisses her back, his hands settling on the curve of her back; he doesn't have to think to do it. And yet-

"I missed you," she tells him, pulling away and looking at his face. She is wide eyed and beaming, her eyes so green.

He tries, "Daphne, I-" but she kisses him again. Her mouth is soft and it is the easiest thing to kiss her back, so habitual and familiar, but there is a feeling in Oliver's gut he can't shake. He doesn't push her away and he feels guilty for that.

The feeling is only made worse when Pansy finds them.

They both turn to look at her, her mouth open helplessly and her left hand pointing at the door ready to form an excuse. Or an apology. As if she is the intruder, as if Oliver isn't holding Daphne to him in the middle of Pansy's private rooms, her belongings all around them – as if the space isn't hers to enter as she pleases.

Oliver just stares at her.

Daphne extracts herself from his arms with a quick 'Majesty', then kisses Oliver's cheek for show and exits the room. He moves to apologise but Pansy is no longer looking at him, her eyes staring off into the distance. Oliver takes the chance to take her in.

She appears smaller than the last time he saw her.

She has lost weight by the look of it. Above the neckline of her dress, her collarbones sit starkly prominent underneath her skin; at her cuffs, her wrists are more delicate, and on her face, her cheekbones are more pronounced. Even before she was always tiny compared to him – smaller, paler, nowhere near his six foot, well muscled stature, but now he looks at her and can only imagine how her hands would look in his, how easily his fingers could encircle her wrists.

She breaks the silence with the statement, "You are looking well, sir."

Oliver has no reply. He cannot say she does look well for she looks- tired, more drawn out. But she is obviously not unwell either, just _smaller_. He gives her, "Thanks to you," earning himself a nod in return.

Silence falls over them both again and Oliver searches for something to say. _Anything_ to say to her. It has been nearly three months since he last stood before her; his stitches are healed and he no longer feels any pain from any injury. But he has told her all of this in their letters. Now he needs something to say, after months of telling her everything, but nothing comes to mind.

Footsteps come behind them and they both turn.

Cho beams at the sight of her friend, a sound erupting from her as she practically leaps towards Pansy and wraps her in a hug. "You," she exclaims, high and excited. "You are here; I am here. I have missed you so."

Cedric enters behind her.

Oliver offers his cousin a smile as greeting and Cedric grins back, jerking his head towards Cho telling Pansy, "Let me look at you," as if their reunion is some sort of sweet moment for Oliver and Cedric to share. Oliver barely manages a smile back, feeling like a liar. He can't claim the same connection to Pansy's happiness as his cousin can over Cho's – their relationships do not match at all.

"Cedric," Pansy calls. Once she is free of Cho's embrace – one she seems reluctant to ever leave – Cedric dives in, sweeping her up into a hug and lifting Pansy into the air as if they are old friend. She smiles easily for him, laughing as she places her hands on his shoulder with a practiced simplicity Oliver is jealous of. "It is so good to see you."

"Your Majesty, it has been too long."

Oliver looks away, suddenly overwhelmed with how much he doesn't fit in this space.

 

+

 

Pine rushes to and from his seat a grand total of twelve times during breakfast. Every time he comes to Pansy's chair, she tells him the same thing, "She said _after_ breakfast, you must finish first. Then she will be here."

Oliver has been seated beside her. He catches her eye once or twice or the rim of her cup as she drinks but he never manages to begin a conversation. He has a few things he could say – "It's good to see you." or "How did you sleep?" or even "Thank you for letting me have your bed; where did you sleep?" because his wife never came to bed last night and Oliver had laid awake on the right side of the bed for hours, making sure there was enough space for her to take once she did come – but none of them feel wholly right.

When Pine gets hiccups, Oliver takes the chance to say to Pansy, "He seems excited. I wasn't aware your family were so close to Madame Tonks."

Pansy licks the last of her water from her lips and nods. A smile curve along her mouth. "She all but raised us, back in Fontainebleau." Oliver lets his face go thoughtful, turning in his chair to listen to her properly. With his meal finished, a server appears to his left and takes his plate, Pansy passing the man a 'thank you' before returning to her conversation with Oliver. "My father wished to keep her near but my mother frowned upon the idea of his mistress living with us, so he had Madame Tonks installed in our home as our governess. Titled her and all."

"But you had a mother."

A frown takes over Pansy's face and Oliver wishes he could take his words back. She shakes her head, the movement travelling down to her shoulders, as if she wore feathers and he had truly ruffled them with his words. "She- yes. We had a mother. But she was. . . distant is the wrong word but it is all I have. She was distant. But not in a cruel way."

"Oh?" It comes out without his permission but it makes Pansy turn her face back to him and Oliver can't regret that.

She looks sad and sorry all at once. He wants to reach out to her, make the look leave her face, but something in him stops his hand moving towards her. She lets her eyes drop. "She was ill a lot when we were young. I didn't realise it at the time, didn't fully understand it until she died, but a lot of things caused her pain. And with five children running around, tugging out of her, it was a lot for her. I think she tried to stay away because of that. Took herself out of the situation rather than struggle to be a part of it." A smile quirks at the corner of her mouth as her eyes are glazed over, remembering something. Oliver just regards her, waiting for her to continue. "Persimmon always tried with her though, always tried to include her, keep her close. But-" She stops, casting her eyes around the table to see who may be listening. Oliver leans in. "Madame Tonks was the one there the most for us."

"So, it is as if his mother is returning for your brother then," Oliver notes.

Pansy nods. "For Primrose too. She tried on four dresses before deciding she liked the first one the most this morning." There's laughter in her voice, sunny, bright. "We are all excited to see her."

Oliver ignores the second half of her sentence, asking instead, "You were with Primrose this morning? Did you sleep in her rooms last night? You never came to bed." He means for it come out nonchalantly, a quick off the cuff thing, but he misses the mark with his last statement.

Pansy eyes him. "I slept in my rooms last night."

Again, he gives her, "Oh?"

"There are more places in there to sleep than just the bed, sir. I felt you could use it after your journey." She stands from her chair. "And I tend to sleep restlessly, so I left you alone."

It is easy to catch her lie but Oliver lets her away with it, telling her instead, "Don't give up your bed on my account; if there are other places to sleep, I will take one of them tonight and you may have your bed back." She thanks him softly, then excuses herself from the table and his company, and again, Oliver lets her away with it easily. At the door, Pine catches up with his sister, the two of them sweeping from the room with their shoulders at matching heights and wearing the same colours, mustard and gold.

 

+

 

The entire court is out to wait upon Madame Tonks' arrival.

In the centre of them stands the King, his hat ridiculously plumed with bright green and his stockings white, as he stands amid a crowd of black cloaks – Lady Malfoy, her son Draco, Lady Black-Lestrange, Rabastan and Rodolphus. Pansy stands near them, Pine beside her with his hands clasping and unclasping, his excitement clear. This close to her brothers, Oliver sees the resemblance but, from his memories of Persimmon – as short as their friendship was – he sees his face in Pansy's.

Blaise is all smiles when he takes up a spot next to Pansy, a kiss to both her cheeks and again, as she had with Cedric, there is a simple ease to her movements around him.

Oliver stands next to Cedric now, across the courtyard from his wife and her family, and moves his head to stare at the ground.

Pine is the first to break the line when Madame Tonks steps from her carriage. Her horses, great white palominos, do not react at all to the Prince dashing down the blue carpet rolled out for their owner, and ignore it even more when Pansy breaks through and chases after her brother, calling his name.

He hears her say, "I'm sorry," to Madame Tonks but there is a smile on her face that suggests she is the opposite. Madame Tonks cups her face, a delighted look spreading over her features as she looks at Pansy. "He's never been one to follow rules."

Madame Tonks laughs, bright and sparkling.

Pine squeezes them both together in a hug.

From the middle of them, Madame Tonks announces, "Come, come, let us greet the rest of them. It has been far too long since I was in Paris – I have more faces to reacquaint myself with than merely you two. Come, and tell me all."

 

+

 

"The wedding is tomorrow," Cedric explains. "Following it, the Princess will leave for Spain the next afternoon with her new husband, and the next day the King is holding a hunt." He points at Oliver, "You have been invited to that."

"I'm honoured," he intones, mocking.

Cedric keeps going, "The watch around the palace will be quietest during the Princess' goodbye and the morning of the hunt. There are a few loyal to your wife who have agreed to help us – either of these times would be the best for her to leave."

Cho chimes in, "Pansy won't leave before saying goodbye to Primrose," and Cedric smiles as if she has said the greatest proclamation he has ever heard. She smiles for him, sunny with it. "She won't," she attests. "And if she is already in the courtyard to watch Primrose leave, it will be difficult to get her out of there."

"So the hunt," Oliver offers. "That would be our best opportunity."

"And Pine," Cho throws out.

Oliver sighs. 

She insists, "She won't leave without saying goodbye to Pine. Posey – Posey barely talks to her as it is, she says he hasn't even looked at her in weeks, but Pine is. Pine is Pine. Pansy won't leave without seeing him before she goes."

"Anyone else?"

Cho scowls at him. "They are her younger siblings. They mean something to her." The way she snaps it has Oliver standing to attention, afraid of her anger. "It's the least you can do for her."

"I'm trying to get her safely out of Paris!"

"Yes, and she has saved your life _and_ safely gotten you out of Paris, so you will let her say goodbye to Prim and Pine." Oliver tries to turn to Cedric for back up, for anything really, but Cedric is too busy smiling in wonder at the side of Cho's face, so enamoured with everything about her. "We can wait until the hunt." And that settles it.

Oliver deflates, defeated but nodding in agreement. Saying goodbye to Pine and Primrose is the least he can give his wife.

 

+

 

Blaise passes the message to Pansy for him. When he tells her, Pansy's head lifts for a moment, her eyes travelling over to Oliver across the room. Oliver gives her a smile, even if her gaze only touches his face for a second, perhaps less. Posey asks, "Are you in, sir? We are waiting." And Oliver throws money, however much his fingers wrap around onto the pile in the middle of the table. It doesn't matter; the King is going to win it all anyway.

 

+

 

It is her.

The mask, the cloak, the way she holds herself more in the shadows than in the light. It is her and she is Pansy. Oliver should have known. He should have known – God, he was a fool then.

Pansy turns to look at him when he takes a step, his heel making a sound against the stone beneath them. Her eyes are wide, startlingly brown next to the black velvet of her mask, and her mouth opens to release a small sound. Soft, like a gasp. Oliver steps towards her, fitting himself around her and pulling her close. He holds her face in his hands. "You," he tells her.

And then he kisses her.

It's a little off centre, a little sloppy and uncoordinated – Oliver's mouth too dry – but it is the easiest thing in the world. And Pansy kisses back. Briefly. Just for a moment. But when Oliver needs to pull back, taking in air when it becomes necessary, she is gone. Twisting her face out of his hands and lifting one of her own to touch at her lips, carefully.

"I'm sorry," he says, unsure what he is really apologising for. But it is a start. He repeats it to steady him, "I'm sorry. I shouldn't have- but. It's you."

"I said I would be here," Pansy counters.

He tries out, "That's not-" but decides he doesn't like it, instead taking a breath and telling her, "The mask. You were the girl in the mask that night. It, _she_ was you." He tells her again, "I'm sorry." Pansy looks at him like a question. Oliver wants to kiss her again, if only just to feel her kiss him back. "I'm sorry for that night. I'm sorry for how I acted."

"Don't. . ."

But he doesn't let her go any further with it, cutting in with, "No, please. I shouldn't have been that way. But I thought. . . it was all an act. Everything I did. It was all for politics, it wasn't real, and I thought if I didn't care for you, if I acted like that but did what they said, then it would be enough. No one would get hurt because I had done what I agreed to." He keeps explaining, "I thought if I did what I was told and put some distance between us, then it would just be politics." He can't stop speaking, words rushing out of him; he has to explain it all to her, he has to apologise for it all. "But then you- you saved my life. You got me out of the city. You wrote to me all that time I was in Pau, that I was gone." He confides, "You weren't playing a part."

Pansy attempts to get away from him once more, her arm out to keep him back. "Please, don't do this." She pleads, "Please don't do this; they said you would do this."

He wants to reach for her but he respects the space she has put between them, even as it feels bigger than the few steps it is. He asks, "Who did?"

"They all did," she answers but it explains nothing. "They said that when you came back, you would try and make me your ally again. That you would try to gain my trust." She says, "But I know you came back for her."

Oliver has to close his eyes to avoid seeing the look on his wife's face. "I swear to you, I didn't come back for Daphne."

"I saw you two together-"

"It wasn't anything. She found me. I was looking for you."

Pansy scoffs, guttural and deep. "You expect me to trust you?"

"Are you telling me you trust them?"

He is angry, his tone loud, his hand making a sweeping gesture through the air more violently than it needs to be. He is angry but not with her – Pansy flinches from him anyway. "No." she answers, small, but she finds her ground quickly, righting herself and setting her jaw with her next breath. She says, "You have been gone for months."

"You could have followed."

"I can't just _leave_ ," she fires back. And there is the Pansy he remembers. The Princess of Valois, stubborn, proud, refusing to give any inch. Oliver could kiss her again, wants to kiss her so badly when she is like this. He watches her mouth as she says, "I am the King's sister, there are eyes on me at all times. I can't just leave Paris without a word."

"Yes you can."

Pansy rolls her eyes, a beautiful show of them framed by the black mask. "There are eyes everywhere."

As if on cue, footsteps pass by the top of the stairs, chattering voices and laughter filtering down the corridor to them, revellers drunk on wine and good spirits from Primrose's wedding. Oliver steps closer to her, her hand now lowered between them, as if blocking her from the noise. He waits for silence to settle once more, then says, "You managed to get me out."

Her eyes read over his face.

"We have a plan, to get you out too."

Their hands touch. "When?" she asks. She takes his hand in her own. Oliver smiles. "It is my sister's wedding. The palace is filled with people. The King's men-"

"Will be gone with him on the hunt in two days."

Pansy's face flickers with something Oliver can't read. "Only men are allowed attend the King's hunt. I cannot go with you."

"No," Oliver agrees. "But you can leave after us. Without the King present it will be easy for you to slip away."

Pansy laughs. Oliver leans into the sound.

She asks, "And where will I go? They're bound to notice before I reach Pau."

"Fontainebleau."

"And what about you?"

"I will find you there. We are set to stop at 1 for lunch; I will slip away then and come to you. Then we can return to Pau together."

Pansy looks caught between wanting to cry and wanting to laugh. She asks, thin and quiet, "Can I trust you?"

She allows him to touch her face. Oliver breathes in the sight of her before her, leans in to kiss her cheek. "Trust that I wish to save the person who saved my life."

A smile takes her mouth.

"That, I can trust."

 

+

 

They return to the great hall and go their separate ways. Pansy slips from him as soon as they are through the door, no glance back to him even as Oliver watches her go. She is drawn back into a group with smiles and soft hands place on hers in greeting, and someone rises from their chair, offering it to her.

Guido takes the seat beside Pansy.

Oliver watches him from across the room, where he has gotten himself trapped in a conversation with Posey about hunting boar while Pine looks on at them disgusted, green around the gills and drinking wine uselessly to counter it.

Pansy smiles for him when Guido touches his thumb to the back of her neck, stroking her hairline and then further down, along her skin. Her smile is all teeth but not sharp, reaches her eyes with a softness in them and she angles herself towards him.

Posey casts his eyes towards her, following Oliver's glare. He laughs, a bellow of it. "Don't tell me you're jealous," he chides with a shake of his head. His hair catches the light with the move. "You have been away, of course another man is trying to take over the space you left empty – my sister is beautiful."

Oliver nods despite himself.

Pine scoffs in disgust. "Guido is not her type," he insists. 

The way his nose wrinkles at his brother reminds Oliver too much of Pansy. He looks back over at his wife and sees she has pulled Cho onto her lap, the two of them listening, delighted, as Guido tells a story. From across the room, Oliver can just hear how his accent twists the words, thickening them with his rich, heavy tongue. He wants to dislike him, this great Italian man with the ability to make his wife smile in delight, enchanted with him, but instead Oliver's mood is directed at Posey. For being right. For calling him out on his jealousy.

Oliver scowls, turning his face away from where Pansy's laugh rises into the air of the room.

He meets the face of the King and finds it sneering at him.

Oliver barely manages to quell the urge to punch him. Not at his sister's wedding, not when Pansy's mood has broken and everyone is smiling. And not when it is not Posey's fault he is young and more easily manipulated than his siblings – Oliver quells the urge to punch Posey behind a wall of realising he is just a misguided boy, trying on a vicious streak with him tonight.

"If she is happy," Oliver gets out, settling on a smile, "then I have no right to be jealous of who she speaks to."

Posey claps his hand off Oliver's shoulder, practically cackling out his laugh. "That's the spirit!" he proclaims. "You, of course, know that all good unions sometimes have others in to warm the marriage bed. Take my father for instance; he gave our mother five children yet never left his mistress' side!" He nudges at Oliver's shoulder again, directing his attention back to Pansy where Madame Tonks has stopped, Cho in the middle of kissing her cheeks as they watch, welcoming her as if today, this moment, is the first time she has seen her since she arrived.

"And we are all fine," Posey finishes.

Pine drains the last of his wine and clutches at the stem of his empty cup. "If you don't mind," he fumes, already stepping back from his brother, "but I am going to join our sister. Her company is more to my taste." He sways as he walks away.

Madame Tonks sets her arm around his shoulder and pulls him in tight to her side once Pine is with them.

Posey nudges Oliver again. Oliver wishes he wouldn't, his arm jostled with every one. "Perhaps," and Posey speaks as if he is selecting each syllable carefully, picking only the right ones, "if you wish your wife to return some of your jealousy, you should go and speak to _your_ mistress." And, for the third time, he nudges Oliver as he also jerks his head across the room to where Daphne stands.

It isn't where Oliver wishes to go, but it gives him an open exit from the conversation. He offers Posey a smile as a goodbye and walks away.

He is almost expecting it when Daphne asks him to come to her room later.

He doesn't expect to find her dead when he goes.

Or Pansy to be in the room as well.

 

+

 

"I swear, I didn't touch her." She tells him, "I swear. When I came in the room and she was already choking. She was coughing up blood, there was blood coming out of her mouth and she started to fall. I caught her. But that's all I did. I didn't do anything to her." And Oliver pulls his wife in, her blood sticky fingers gripping his shirt, sharing the stain from her hands with him, but he doesn't let her go. Pansy keeps speaking, words tumbling out of her mouth, out of her control, but she buries her face into Oliver's chest, his neck, her nose butting into his skin where his collar flops open. "I didn't kill her," she vows, and Oliver believes her, stroking a hand over her hair and letting her begin to cry.

 

+

 

The doctor tells them, "Poison. In the wine." He explains, "Fast acting, yet not immediate. She was able to have a glass and put it down before it started to take effect."

"The blood?" Pansy asks, her voice dropping out, running thin before she can make a question of it but the doctor understands her meaning.

"The poison attacked from the stomach. The effects started when it reached there, causing her to vomit."

Oliver nods. Pansy opens her mouth to speak again but Oliver nods to the four guards at the door, waiting to remove Daphne's body from the room. "Thank you," he says to the doctor, ushering him towards the door as the four guards carefully lift Daphne. Pansy can't bring herself to watch them leave with her. Oliver is glad when they go – he doesn't want to his wife to hear any more.

She is pale as a ghost once they are all gone.

He calls to her gently. "Your Majesty." She ignores him. It is her name from his mouth that earns him her attention. "Pansy," and he reaches for her.

"They tried to kill you again," she whispers, rushing it all out quickly.

She wraps her arms around herself, lifts a hand to her throat, putting up a visible barrier. "And now she's dead."

"Pansy," Oliver tries for the second time.

"At Primrose's wedding," she continues, "at her _wedding_. At least they gave me the honour of waiting a few days before murdering anyone, before trying to kill you."

"Primrose isn't marrying me," he laughs, "they don't have to wait."

Pansy only glares.

"Come here," he urges, beckoning her over with an open palm. "Just. . . come here."

She moves to him. Oliver removes her hand from her throat and wraps it in his own. "They killed Daphne," she mutters, stiff in his arms but not fighting him away. "How many more people have to die?"

Her eyes close as Oliver kisses her hair. He shouldn't. But he does all the same.

"Daphne just died."

She practically scoffs out the words, still a whisper but Oliver catches the snap of the sharp consonants.

"You're my wife," he reminds her.

Pansy goes still, not even breathing. Oliver pulls back to properly look at her face. She stares off into the corner of the room, expression blank. "Who found your lover dying just moments before you came into the room."

"I know," he murmurs. "But she was your friend too."

Pansy's hand on his arm takes him by surprise. Once it is there, he expects her to pull his arm off and get away from him, but Pansy silently wraps her fingers around him and holds him to her. Oliver leans his face back against her; he doesn't try to comfort her with a kiss this time.

 

+

 

Astoria looks horrified and hurt. She looks like she wants to scream in Oliver's face – and Oliver will accept it if she does – but it doesn't make Oliver recant and take back the hand he offers to Pansy as she lounges on the window seat.

"C'mon," he prompts. "Come to bed."

She keeps her eyes on Oliver but he knows she wants to look to Astoria. Her sister has just died and the man she was in love with is asking another woman to bed with him – Oliver would look too if the situations were reversed. But Pansy has the grace and tact of a princess, keeps her eyes on Oliver and informs him, "I am quite well here, thank you, sir."

He shakes his head.

Millicent stands off to the left, awkwardly holding pillows and unsure of who to look at.

"It is your bed, you take it. If you wish me out of the room, I will sleep out here. Not you," he says.

He silently dares Astoria to say something. But it is Millicent who says, "Go, your Majesty. The window seat is not the best space in the room to sleep and he is right, the bed is yours."

It takes another few seconds but Pansy takes Oliver's offered hand. Her palm is warm on his. "I-" she fumbles.

"Go," Millicent repeats, standing firm.

Oliver passes her a smile of gratitude.

In her room, with the door closed, Pansy sits on the edge of the bed. Oliver stares at the chair in the corner – the clothes across it are his and can be easily moved. He lifts a shirt off the seat as he says, "Get some sleep, your Majesty. I will take the chair."

"Oliver."

He stops. He stops and it takes him a second or two to turn around and look at her. It is the first time she has properly said his name. He blinks.

Pansy pats the rest of the bed beside her. "There is no need," she offers, "sleep here."

"Majesty-"

"Tomorrow, they will be watching us. You may as well have a good night's rest before facing them all."

Oliver edges towards the bed. It dips where his knee touches it. Fully dressed, Pansy lies back, her head resting on the pillows – she only takes up a small space of the bed. Oliver wets his lips, mouth suddenly too dry. It feels like more, a larger offer than just a space of her bed to sleep on. It feels monumental. His voice cracks as he confirms, "Are you sure?"

She smiles. "There is more than enough space."

He settles beside her in an instant, unexpectedly tired all of a sudden. She extinguishes the candles and he hears without seeing her move away, the rustle of the sheets as she pulls them over herself. Oliver barely dares to breathe as they lie there, not wishing to disturb her.

She breaks the silence with, "Be warned, Pine may come in later. Or wake us early. He has yet to learn how to knock."

Oliver laughs and looks towards her in the dark but can't make anything out.

 

+

 

Even Lady Black-Lestrange, whose stoic face rarely wears its feelings openly without her permission, looks shocked to see Oliver next to Pansy. She sits, next to her sister – although not as open mouthed as Lady Malfoy – and blinks twice, as if she expects Oliver to disappear. "You look well rested, your Majesty," she forces out, her mouth contorting into an approximation of a smile, addressing Pansy alone.

There are pearls in Pansy's hair. They clink lightly off one another as she moves her head, answering. Oliver doesn't listen to her words, fixated on the harsh contrast of her dark hair and the white of the pearls. He reaches to place his hand on her without thinking.

Pansy's words croak away to nothing at his touch.

Madame Tonks trills out a laugh, thrilled by them apparently. "Oh," she sighs, dreamily, "reunited and getting used to one another once more. Lovely."

Oliver notes the way the other two Black sisters stare at her.

 

+

 

Once more, the King has occupied his sister's rooms with a card game, holding Pansy and her friends captive with him within the space. His men move about the place – flirting with her ladies as Posey deals another hand, interrupting the musicians as they attempt to play. The King is all smiles and it sets a shiver to Oliver's spine, anxiously waiting for something to happen.

Across the room, Astoria is unbraiding pearls from Pansy's hair while another one of her ladies – she has her back turned to Oliver, he cannot name her – is applying gold pigment to the centre of Pansy's lips. Oliver catches her eyes and she rolls them at him.

His laugh has all the other men seated at the card table turning to look at Pansy. Her smile is graceful in response, a small bow of her head for her brother the King.

No one comments so Oliver has nothing to respond to.

Posey deals out another hand.

Oliver looks at the six in his hands and just manages to halt the crow of delight that attempts to bubble its way out of him. He looks up from the cards to everyone else at the table, carefully taking them in -- it seems none of them noticed his reaction. He smiles down at his cards again and waits for the game to begin.

Draco is the first person out, folding his hand and tapping the cards face down on the table. "I would be a fool to play on," he tells the King, Posey grinning as if he has already won.

His grin morphs into shock when Oliver reveals his hand. All the other faces at the table look horrified. Oliver's hand is better than Posey's. The pile of money on the table is _his_ to take, not the King's. Oliver eyes Posey, considering. By now, the rest of the room has turned to focus their attention on the game -- a stalemate has settled over the table, everyone waiting, barely even breathing, for Oliver to make his next move.

He bellows out a laugh.

"Your Majesty," he says, the ripple of laugh in his words. "It would appear I have won."

Someone gasps.

Pansy has risen from her chair for a better view.

Oliver laughs again but now fear has set into it, the pressure of everyone's eyes on him. Everyone knows you are not meant to beat a king at anything, but especially not when there is money to be won. Oliver lets his eyes move over to Pansy. There's a smile around one corner of her mouth and when their eyes meet, she shakes her head. Oliver opens his mouth to inhale a breath.

"But, of course, I would be a fool to steal from the crown." He waves his hand over the money. "My cards may have been better, but the prize is still yours." He adds, "Your Majesty."

The entire room seems to deflate on a sigh of relief.

Posey laughs.

Oliver does too, relaxing into it, leaning backwards on his chair.

Of course, it topples.

His arms flap in the air but they are useless to preventing him falling to the ground.

His wife is the first person over to him. She laughs because Oliver does, sunny and warm and a smiling splitting her face all for him as she asks, "Are you alright?"

Oliver keeps laughing.

Pansy strokes a hand down his face, palm soft against the scratch of his beard. "I heard the crash, looked up and saw you were no longer at the table." The tips of their noses touch as she leans into him. "I was worried – it sounded worse than it seems to have been."

Worry settles around her brow and Oliver touches her face to counter it. "I'm fine," he states. "Only a small fall, nothing more."

"Good."

Her mouth presses into his. He feels the smudge of her gold pigment against his beard. Oliver pushes his mouth back into Pansy's and her fingers stroke his face. They separate and he shrinks back, head hitting the floor again.

From the table, Posey sighs dramatically, his voice petulant and childish. "Sister, the table is waiting to continue our game."

Pansy rises up and takes Oliver's hand to help him upright again. A server pulls the chair away, settling it back into position for him and Oliver gives them a quick 'thank you' for it. Posey eyes them. Oliver knows there is gold on him from Pansy's mouth. He can't bring himself to look at the King. And he feels a blush spreading across his face, hot and red.

"Is your husband alright?" Posey asks his sister.

Pansy nods with a smile. "Quite well, your Majesty." And with that, she leaves them to their cards.

They play for another hour, and then into a second before she comes back. Her arms wraps around Oliver's shoulders but her eyes are on her brother. "The hour is late, your Majesty," she sounds out carefully. "Myself and my ladies are growing tired. And I know you have rooms of your own if you wish to continue, so I would ask you to retire to them and allow us all to go to bed."

Posey's eyes dart between Oliver and Pansy. He considers his sister's words. "Am I to take it that Oliver will not be joining us after we have left?"

"That is entirely up to Oliver," she replies.

Oliver accepts the offer and declines following the King and his friends from the room. For a moment, Posey halts at the door, the rest of his party continuing without him, and he watches Pansy from the step. She keeps Oliver close to her -- he notes the way Posey's brows settle, as if he is stirring for a fight. "Goodnight, your Majesty," Pansy gives to him, throwing him a curtsey for show.

Posey ruffles but manages a stiff 'goodnight, sister' in return, then turns on his heel and leaves.

Oliver takes her hand and pulls her back into the room, through her ladies and into her bedroom. The door shuts behind them and Pansy stops once her back has come to rest against one of the posts of her bed. He shakes his head, not bothering to stop the laugh that comes out of his mouth. "You know he has tried to kill me for less."

Pansy stiffens but only for a second, recovering too quickly from it for Oliver to comment upon it. She shakes her head ,"You were the one who decided to play your hand at cards."

Oliver moves towards her, listening.

"I was just taking the focus from you." She sighs, her shoulders moving with it, bare and pale above the neckline of her dress. "I am more than aware how many times my brother has had a hand in trying to kill you. It would have been better not to vex him at all, but when you had already started, I stepped in."

He softens. "Oh. That's why you kissed me."

"All brothers hate the idea of another man touching their sister, Posey is no different to anyone else. Even if he is the King."

He says, "You have done your duty as his subject. We are married, the religions are united." Pansy's nose wrinkles with the smile on her lips. "Whatever else happens between us does not concern him."

She changes the subject with, "There is still gold in your beard."

Oliver casts his eyes over her lips – a lingering trace of gold sits on the curve of her top lip but he thinks if he were a step further from her, it would not be noticeable. He tells her, "There is barely any left on you." 

Her palm is warm when it cups his face. Pansy angles him directly to her and her thumb swipes over the swell of his top lip, brushing the pigment from him. He looks at it shine on her skin. "I must have given you all of it, sir."

If he heard anyone else use this line, Oliver would groan, but it fits the moment between them when he asks, "Would you like it back?" He is pushing, just a little. But Pansy was the one to kiss him tonight and where Oliver usually tries to be careful with her, makes sure he keeps the boundaries between them, he pushes them now. He pushes, and Pansy yields.

She is the one to close the gap between them. Her nails scrape along the silver silk of his jacket as her fingers pull him in, holding him to her. Oliver goes where she wants him, drinks in the air of her exhale on his next inhale before sealing his mouth over hers again. The hand on his face moves to his neck, her fingers stroking his hair where it has grown long, now almost to his collar. He hums against her lips before he pulls away.

She doesn't let him get far.

"Come to bed." Her words send a ripple down his spine, a spread of warmth through his chest as his eyes travel over the light flush of her cheeks and how soft her mouth looks in the light of the candles. Oliver shakes his head and a gentle exhale of a laugh comes from his lips. Pansy just blinks, waiting for him to move next.

He leans in and kisses her again, this time her head bumping back against the wooden bedpost but Oliver swallows down her gasp with a push of his tongue along her lips. Pansy opens her mouth easily for him. She gives, holding him close, no longer bothering to stop for air between kisses, and yet Oliver still has to ask: "Are you sure?"

He kisses along her neck – he tugs with unsteady fingers at the neckline of her dress to get at more of his wife's skin – giving her space and air to answer him. His pushing hadn't been for this. It hadn't. And even though she gives, he waits for an answer.

It comes in the form: "You aren't the first man I have brought to my bed."

Oliver returns to her face, to her mouth. It wears a smile when he pushes his own against it. "That's not what I asked," he responds and Pansy's laugh hums on his lips. His hands settle on her waist, pulling her in.

"I am here, I asked you to bed." She gives him her cheek, taking in a breath of air and Oliver mouths over her skin. "Is that not enough for you?"

His nose presses to the bones of her face.

Pansy's fingers clutch at his neck.

"Whatever you want, my answer is yes." She says, "I'll even be her, if that's what you want," and it feels like a punch to the gut. Oliver almost stumbles with the force of it. It takes entirely too long for her eyes to meet his but when she does, her face is unreadable. "I just-" Pansy blinks and when her eyes open again, she's looking away. "I want to have you, before they try and take you from me again."

Their teeth clash when he brings their mouths back together. Her hand finds Oliver's side, tripping over the wrinkles in his shirt where it's starting to untuck from his breeches. She gets under it and her palm is warm next to his skin, soft, and solidly there.

Oliver tells her, "I don't want her." He tells her, "I'm sorry." He kisses Pansy and says, "I'm here. With you. And I'm not going anywhere."

He gasps at the drag of her nails along his skin. His hands skitter along her bodice, now too much, now just an inconvenience – Oliver wants his hands and lips and teeth and his tongue on her skin, wants to push every apology she deserves to hear from him into her skin with his fingertips, make up for every second he was away from her with his lips. The woman before him – wearing a bodice he cannot remove because his fingers are stupid and Oliver is too caught up in the moment to remember how to use his hands for anything other than touch – is not the woman he expected to marry, not the idea of Pansy of Valois he had in his head but she _is_ Pansy, sister of the King of France and Oliver's wife, and that thought is suddenly too much. Too much and not enough, as are the kisses he spreads across her skin.

And yet, even with all this, Pansy manages to remove Oliver's shirt and lets it fall to the floor.

Oliver lifts her up and Pansy follows with him. Her skirts are heavy, thick material and long, but together they get them out of the way and Pansy wraps her legs around him. One of her hands claws for the ties of his breeches. They travel towards the bed together, lying back on it more fluidly than a fall. Oliver still hasn't figured out the ties of Pansy's bodice. His fingers stumble. Her hand strokes over his thigh, over his crotch where he's hard, and Oliver gives up on them completely.

He hand isn't shaking when he touches her skin. It isn't.

Their clothes remain as they are, Pansy's skirts pushed out of the way and Oliver's mouth kissing at the skin he can reach at her neck and chest, his hands and mouth suddenly too taken with her to work for any more. He drags her by the hips to his lap, his breeches untied, and when he fucks into her, he moves as if he has a point to prove.

Pansy's mouth presses a gasp into his skin.

His hands hold her hips in place but she moves in his grip, small rolls of her hips into his cock. Her entire body moves with want and Oliver works with her, fucks her as she wraps her legs around him, one of her knees butting his flank. Pansy whimpers but it changes itself into a moan, and she tells him, "I want-" as she draws her mouth along his cheekbone, grazing her lips with the rough edge of his beard. Oliver gives her his mouth, tasting the plush of her lips.

She trembles as he smoothes his left hand up from her hip, up towards her ribs, and he has to pull away for air.

He buries his head next to her face. His body completely covers hers and she makes these sharp, pleased noises every time he moves in her. Even with his breathing ragged, difficult to take in as he tries to suck in air through the bedding, he is groaning with every move, louder than her.

Oliver bites her neck to try and hide the next noise from himself but she just laughs.

A hand finds his shoulder blade, the back of his neck, his hair and yanks him back up. His forehead rests upon hers. It can't be comfortable, he is much heavier than her leaning all his weight into her, but Pansy doesn't push him away. Her nails draw through his hair and Oliver keens into her.

He whispers, "Can I?" his breath ghosting over her skin before he kisses her. He tastes the salt of the sweat around her mouth. Pansy nods for him.

Again, her breath comes out in a gasp against his lips and Oliver chuckles back. He pulls her hips properly onto his lap, sitting Pansy on his cock and making her draw both her knees up tightly around him. He fucks her like this, barely pulling out before pushing deep again, and Pansy meets him with a murmur of 'More!'

Her hand slips down his neck with his sweat.

Oliver starts to ask, "What," as he repositions himself, moving his head off hers as he is rolling his hips into her, drawing noises out of her mouth. He tries again once his hand is holding him up, away from, "What do you need?"

He lifts his free hand to his mouth, wets his fingers with his tongue, and reaches down to her cunt. She's slick and soft where he touches and Oliver watches as a blush colours her face at the first press of his fingers. He strokes over her and she hisses, her hips jumping. Oliver groans at the drag over his dick. "It's-" she begins but doesn't finish. Oliver moves his fingers back and forth, taking care to note the spots Pansy tries to move away from his touch and where has her pushing into his hand.

She sighs out, "Yes," and Oliver smiles, finding a rhythm with his fingers he can match wish his hips, fucking back into her again.

Pansy pulls his mouth back to hers and Oliver's elbow trembles from the angle as they kiss.

He comes before she does. He comes and Pansy whines, Oliver's hips pushed flush against hers and his fingers stilling on her cunt. She pets at his back, his hair, the nape of his neck, as he shakes through it, rocking into her and moaning into her mouth. She swipes her tongue across his lips. He pulls away panting, withdrawing.

Pansy begins to tremble. Her hands paw at him, trying to pull him in. He goes easily with it, stroking his fingers around and then into her, finding her cunt wet with both of them. He soothes her down with, "I'm here, I'm here," unsure why he picks those words but Pansy drinks them from him, taking kisses from him as he fucks her with his fingers.

Oliver pulls away to watch her come -- she goes silent and her back arches from the bed, bottom lip bitten beneath her teeth. Her head dips backwards, away from him, but Oliver knows her eyes have flickered closed.

After she's come, Pansy doesn't let Oliver get away. But he has no intention of going anywhere. His fingers fist in her hair, a dark messy thing across the sheets, and he takes her mouth in a kiss.

 

+

 

Her bodice unties at her back.

Pansy sweeps her hair away for him, twisting it around and around in her closed fist as Oliver unloops ribbon and buttons behind her. He kisses her shoulder for good measure.

Her dress falls to the floor and Oliver pulls her back to bed with him.

 

+

 

The knock at the door comes again.

Pansy is a warm stripe along Oliver's back, and her lips brush his skin as she says, "Tell them to go away."

They knock again, a voice accompanying it this time, calling out, "Pansy!"

"That sounds like your brother," Oliver says. She takes back the arm she has draped across him as he turns to face her. Despite last night, they are still adjusting to existing in one another's space. Oliver smiles. She gives him one back. "And, from what I have heard, kings don't like being kept waiting."

"A king will wait if he has to."

Oliver kisses her between one breath and the next, sighing when he has to pull away. "But an entire hunting party will not," he reminds her. He sets his shoulders to move, to turn away and sit up, but Pansy's hand captures him before he has fully moved, pulling him back to her mouth. He strokes his fingers along her skin. "I must go," he whispers into her lips but makes no effort to follow through with it.

This time when Posey knocks, Pansy shouts out, "We are coming!" before her brother can say anything. And she turns back to Oliver to kiss along his cheekbone, voice softer when she agrees with him, "You must go."

He laughs and moves.

Pansy takes up the spot he vacates, sheets made hot there from both of them.

With his breeches on and one last look to Pansy to make sure she is covered, Oliver answers the door. Surprisingly, it is Pine on the other side and Oliver makes himself take a step back, to get a better look at him and make sure he isn't seeing things.

Pine looks bored. "They left me to wait for you."

Oliver's breeches ride low on his hips. "Let him in," Pansy calls from the bed.

Completely ignoring his sister's nakedness in the sheets, Pine lies down on the bed beside her, reclining with his arms folded behind his head as Oliver busies himself with dressing – Oliver feels marginally judged by them both, observing and silent, but he has breeches to fasten and a right shoe to locate, a shirt to put on.

Oliver dresses and Pansy sits up, making sure to keep the sheets wrapped around her front. She pats Pine on the knee. "Be careful out there," she remarks, her voice heavy with sleep and sentiment in equal measure.

"I'm only going because Posey decreed we all must," he answers.

"Still," and she tightens her hold on him, tilting his leg back and forth to emphasise her point. Oliver finds his shoe under the bed. He emerges triumphant and Pansy's eyes are on him. She smiles. "You ready to go?" Her hair is all around her shoulder, long, dark and ruffled from sleep and the pillows. It suits her. Oliver just nods.

Pine rises from the bed with the groan of an old man. "I suppose I am too," he tells them.

Pansy's last words to her brother are: "Enjoy your day. I will see you soon." Then Oliver follows Pine out to meet the others.  
  
  
  
  
  


\+ + +

 

 

 

 

**i v .  A C T  F O U R :  a  f u n e r a l**  


 

The dogs scatter everywhere about the trees, leading the pack. Oliver makes sure to keep himself to the middle of the group, keeping an eye on Pine as well. Pine's horse is larger than Oliver would have given him, a thoroughbred who wants to be with the front of the pack while Pine wants to linger back. The dogs bark and a shadow rushes past them, the animal obscured by the trees.

From the front, Posey calls out, "This way, she's this way."

The doe darts out from her hiding place – the pack turns to follow her.

"She's beautiful," Pine says. With the wind whipping past his ears as they ride, Oliver doesn't hear it properly, but he looks to Pine, who is polite enough to repeat it. "My brother typically goes after boar – he says they are better sport." Oliver nods, remembering their previous conversation on the subject. "But today," and Pine laughs, bitter and hollow, "it is a deer."

"You don't have to do anything," Oliver reminds him. The pack turns around, groups splitting off around trees and Oliver has to watch in front of himself to keep on track. "It is the King's hunt, let him have his sport."

Pine's laugh is more real when he releases the sound this time.

The doe bolts the opposite direction again, turning back on herself. Oliver watches her panic, trapped in.

Dogs bark all around them. 

They run through the legs of horses.

Oliver twists his mount to the right to avoid one, breaking away from Pine. His eyes never leave him but he is too far away when three hunting dogs skid through Pine's horse's legs, sending the poor creature toppling – Oliver can't look away as Pine screams in pain, covering up the sickening, crunching sound of bone with his cries. Oliver reaches out an arm, trying to stop the riders behind them, but he can't move quick enough; two horses trample over the Prince as he lies, trapped under his horse.

There's blood in the corner of his mouth and Pine is eerily silent.

Oliver looks to Posey, who is frozen in place, white faced and open mouthed. He looks so like Pine it is startling.

Everyone stops. Whispers of 'Is he still breathing?' pass through the trees between them.

Oliver is the first off his horse, down on his knees into the mud to reach Pine. The King's men surround them, a group of them moving to lift the horse off of the Prince. "Its knee is broken," one of them announces and it takes Oliver a second to catch up, to realise that he isn't talking about Pine. . . to stop himself saying 'It is more than his knee he has broken'.

There are fallen leaves in Pine's hair, twisted in his curls.

They get the horse off of him, move it away, but Pine can't move.

Blaise appears beside Oliver on the ground, taking the weight of Pine's head on his lap. He looks at Oliver. "Go," he whispers. Pine's eyes flicker. He is struggling to breathe. Around them both is a flurry of movement, Draco barking orders to the assembled men as Posey stays on his horse, frightened and silent. Oliver looks over to him.

"We must return to Paris," Draco shouts.

Blaise takes more of Pine's weight onto himself, removing him from Oliver's hold. "Go," Blaise repeats, louder, and Pine looks up at him. His mouth falls open but he only coughs.

 

+

 

"Pansy!"

The horse barely stops before Oliver climbs off, the gelding staggering back, snorting as Oliver attempts to grab his reins. "Pansy," he shouts again, with a hand on the horse's neck, soothing despite his loud voice. The horse follows him as he walks towards the horseshoe stairway.

The door opens in a hurry.

Pansy appears in blue and silver, her face surprised to see him.

"Your brother," he pushes out.

"Posey?"

"Pine."

Her face moves from shock to horror. Oliver wishes he didn't have to tell her. He wets his mouth, tongue poking out at the corner of his lips. He takes a breath before he speaks. "He fell from his horse. He was trampled."

Pansy rushes down the stairs to him. "When, where is he?" Her hand meets his on the neck of the horse. Their fingertips brush. "Back to Paris," she answers for herself.

"I'm here to take you back to him."

She nods, no hesitation, and Oliver stills the horse to help lift her onto him.

 

+

 

"Where were you?"

This is how Pansy is greeted in the palace, Lady Black-Lestrange all but sneering at her.

There is a smudge of dirt along Pansy's cheek, put there by Oliver's riding glove and the hunt, hours ago. Pansy doesn't flicker or flinch an inch. "I was out for some air."

Lady Black-Lestrange raises a brow. "I see your husband found you," she notes.

Pansy reaches behind her for Oliver's hand. He takes it immediately. "He came- he came to find me after the hunt. He told me about Pine."

Posey twitches like he has been struck.

The crowd remains unmoved. 

"Where is he, Posey?"

His followers around him glare at her but Pansy stays solid; she is smaller than most of them, these imposing, older figures, but Pansy is a princess, daughter of a King, and Oliver stands as watches as she refuses to back down. She keeps her eyes on her younger brother and waits for an answer.

"He is-"

"Pansy!"

All eyes in hallway turn to face Pine. Three guards hold him up. His eyes never stray from his sister. Oliver hears her gasp. Pine can barely stand, his legs bent to painful angles. Oliver once saw a horse with a knee turned practically backwards and knew straight away the poor creature needed to be put down – Pine's legs are the most visible of his injuries but Oliver knows they aren't the only ones, he watched and heard the horses trample all over the boy.

His knee buckles at his first step.

His chest heaves with the struggle to stand.

Pansy stumbles in her first step, as if mirroring Pine. Oliver doesn't let her go.

The crowd parts to allow Pine through them. Every step pains him, every inhale he takes an ache and an effort in his chest. Pansy sticks out an arm to take his weight.

"Pansy," he pushes out again, thin and whispered from lack of air.

"Shhhh," she hushes him. He falls into her, every inch of him trembling. Still Pansy doesn't let go of Oliver's hand. 

"The doctors say there's nothing they can do."

She brushes his sweaty hair away from his face. "Calm yourself," she urges. "I've got you."

Pansy doesn't let anyone touch him, doesn't let Oliver help after she takes her hand back from him. Pine is almost the same height as her but Pansy refuses anyone else's help as she takes all of her brother's weight, lifting him into her arms and beginning to walk away. He hisses in pain but doesn't complain as she cradles him to her. With her first step no one in the council or the King's followers dares to move after, giving Oliver the space to move through them easily and follow his wife.

"No one else is to enter," she orders.

Madame Tonks shuts the door behind them. Pine's nurse fetches water, fluffs his pillows, fusses with various things around the room. Pansy ignores everyone else and lays her brother down. His breath rushes out in a pained gasp and he grabs for her, but Oliver catches the movement of Pansy's shoulders and knows she never had any intention of moving away. Pine still holds her dress to keep her with him all the same.

They make him drink before he speaks. He struggles to swallow but it goes down eventually. He breathes as if he has been running – high, short and hitching, unable to get in a good gulp of air at any time. Oliver feels the amount of pain he must be in as Pine says, "I knew you would leave."

Pansy stumbles over a response, never getting beyond vowel sounds.

Pine shakes his head. There's a whimper with his next intake of breath from the movement. "It's alright. I knew." His eyes move over Oliver, not judging but Oliver feels a shiver run down his spine as Pine looks at him. "I knew- as soon as I saw him." He has to pause to take another breath. "I knew you would leave with him."

"I'm not going anywhere," Pansy insists. This time, she is the one to reach for Pine's hand. He lets her have it. "I'm staying here. With you."

Even Pine's smile seems to hurt him. But one spreads over his face for his sister.

"Is Oliver going to stay too?" he enquires.

Pansy looks over at him. Oliver doesn't know how to react. He lets his gaze drop to the floor, stares at the buckle on his shoes and doesn't look back up until his wife speaks again. "Do you want him to?"

"Yes. Because then you'll stay too."

"Even if you sent him away, I would be here. I'm not going anywhere. I promise."

But Pine doesn't send him away. Instead, Pine tells his sister, "I want you to leave."

She attempts, "Pine-"

"After I'm gone." His breath hitches. Oliver can't see Pansy's face but the set of her spine, the way she cling to her brother's hand, Oliver knows she is crying quietly. "After I am gone, I want you to go. Paris isn't safe – this isn't a good place to be." He inhales again, sharper than before. "I wish I could go with you."

Pansy's shoulders bounce around a soft sob.

"I wish we were in Fontainebleau," Pine admits. Pain flickers across his face, his mouth pulling into a straight, hurt line, as Pansy lifts both his hands to her lips, kissing along their tangled knuckles. "I wish Persimmon were here. I wish you could've married Oliver because you love him." Pansy's next cry is thick, phlegm filled and wet. "I wish Posey hadn't done all of this. I wish none of it had happened."

Oliver watches Pansy's tears run over her brother's fingers. "Don't," she hiccups, begging. "Please don't."

"I wish I wasn't going to die."

A ripple of a shiver runs down Pansy but when she speaks again, her voice sounds stronger. Oliver can't decide if she's trying to comfort her brother or herself more. She says, "Don't speak like that. You are still here." She repeats it once more, "You are still here."

Tears freely flow from Pine's eyes, over his cheeks and sideways to the pillow behind his head. "And you won't leave. Not yet." It's a statement not a question but Pansy replies with a nod. 

From his spot in the room, Oliver observes them all. Madame Tonks leans back on the wall, crying for the little boy she raised for the King; Pine's nurse cries for the Prince who isn't going to live to see his fifteenth birthday; Pansy cries for her little brother, the same way she cried over their older brother as he died too; even Pine cries, for his sister, for his impending death, for the fate of France and everyone in it. But Oliver isn't crying. The realisation makes his throat stick. He feels like an intruder, guilty, then immediately berates himself for thinking about himself as Pine lies dying.

He takes a step but the only one to turn to him is Pine.

"Majesty, I-"

"Please don't," he returns as though he has read the rest of Oliver's sentence from his head. That alone is enough to stop Oliver moving another inch.

They fall silent. And wait.

Eventually, after hours of quiet with only the sound of Pine's laboured breaths to break it, Pine asks Pansy to lie on the bed with him. He asks Madame Tonks and his nurse to join them, the pair taking a corner of the bed each. Pansy releases one of her brother's hands and his nurse takes it in her own.

To Oliver, Pine says, "Come here."

Oliver takes a spot on the bed beside Pansy. His hand finds the curve of her waist and rests there. Pine seems to smile at that. To Oliver, as if no one else is present at all, Pine requests, "You will look after my sister, won't you?"

Pansy's voice sounds out, "Pine."

But Pine ignores her, just looks at Oliver's face, waiting.

Oliver squeezes his fingers around Pansy's waist for a moment. She doesn't look at him; Oliver thinks it is for the best she doesn't. His answer is easy to give. "Of course."

"Good." And Pine sounds so sure of everything. He nods. "That's good." Oliver draws his fingers along Pansy's side. He can feels the shakes of her as she cries, his fingers bump bump bumping along the brocade of her bodice. "I want you to take her out of Paris, take her somewhere safer when this is all over." Pansy's breathing stutters for a second and Oliver soothes his palm over her in response. It takes another heartbeat or two for her to start breathing again. "Don't-" He is forced to stop when he can't catch his breath, his mouth opening wider to gasp in air.

Pansy can barely get words out, scarcely managing to beg her brother, "Pine, please."

"I'm alright," he replies, his breath coming too quickly. Oliver can't look away from him. "I need to know. . . I need to know that I can trust Oliver. To look after you."

Oliver insists, "You can."

He repeats, "You can."

And that is enough to settle Pine.

 

+

 

Prince Pine of Valois and Angouleme dies in his sleep – a fitful, restless thing that keeps the other four awake as they watch him – in the earlier hours of the next morning.

The room is silent.

Oliver counts to ten then back down from it again after Pine's breathing stops.

Pansy is the first to rise away from the bed, her skirts slipping along the floor with a gentle noise. She says, "I will go," before anyone else has time to challenge her movements, reaching the door in a few steps. Her fingers appear too pale and bone thin against the heavy, black metal of the handle. Outside, the guards on either side straighten themselves up with a clink clank clink of their armour having presumably drooped during their wait. Her voice quivers as she tells them, "Go, fetch the King. Tell him-" and she stops. She coughs, hiding how she shakes in it. "Tell him his brother has died."

The guard on the left turns to face her. "Majesty," he tries, lilting it like a question but Pansy shakes her head.

"Go. The King should know," she says and it comes out as an order.

 

+

 

Every statue in the palace chapel has been covered with a shroud. Black banners hang covering the triptych of the altar as Pine's coffin sits before it. It hasn't the space or the majesty of the great basilica where they were married, but Oliver has heard from Pine's nurse he preferred this church. Now, Pansy sits, unblinking and silent, never taking her eyes off her brother's coffin. Blaise is next to her, Millicent next to him, and Cedric and Cho the other side of Oliver. Posey sits alongside Draco and the Black family a few rows ahead.

Behind them, someone whispers to their friend about Pansy, thinking that the hooded covering of their hand will shield their words from everyone else's ears.

Oliver doesn't rise from his seat to tell them to be quiet. To mind their own business. To generally keep their noses out of everyone else's affairs. But it is a close thing – he wants to, but he doesn't. For Pansy. And Pine.

Afterwards, as they follow the coffin from the church and out onto the street, Madame Tonks catches them both in the crowd. Oliver motions for Cedric to continue as he stops with his wife. In Madame Tonks' hands Pansy's skin is too pale, a grey tone to her skin and heavy bags under her eyes. But she smiles at her old governess' touch.

"Have you slept?" she asks.

Oliver could answer for her, but Pansy admits the truth. "Barely. I shall sleep on the journey to Pau."

Her words bring a smile to Madame Tonks' face.

"Good." She adds, "And I hope the mountain air there will perk you up a little more." Oliver lets himself smile at that.

They return to the crowd, following after the coffin, shuffling slowly through the waves of people towards the crypt beneath Saint-Denis. Oliver keeps Pansy in front of him, her back to his chest as he shields her from the public, but a few hands and condolences slip past him to her. She returns each one with a nod and a smile of thanks, too many for Oliver to count.

At the basilica, only family are permitted to enter the crypt. Pansy keeps her grip tight with Oliver and leads him down the stairs.

The tomb next to Persimmon's lies open at the bottom.

"We commit your son, Pine of Valois and Angouleme, back to the earth from where he was raised, Lord," the bishop announces, voice echoing around the low ceiling and statues. "May you grant him peace in his passing and be there to greet him at the gates of Heaven-"

Oliver lets the words wash over him and offers up his own prayer to God. When he opens his eyes again, he finds the King attempting to catch his sister's eye but Pansy just stares silently at the open tomb.

They're the last to leave.

"Majesty?" asks one of the crypt keepers, his hood up and his eyes on Pansy's face. There are two others, standing near the tomb, the solid stone of the lid leaning next to it. "Do you wish us to keep it open longer for you?"

Pansy's face doesn't move.

Her eyes scan over Pine's tomb, then over Persimmon's. The last sounds of people on the stairs die away, the crypt silent all around them. The crypt keepers don't press her for an answer, standing and waiting before the Princess. Oliver allows her her space.

"No. Thank you," she decides. "Close it. I just wanted to say goodbye."

Her fingers trace along the edge of Pine's tomb but Pansy clearly avoids looking in. She turns and her hands touches Persimmon's. Her skirts brush through the dust on the floor, new markings on the ground under her feet from the heavy stone recently moved along it. Behind her, the crypt keepers slide the lid to Pine's tomb closed; it grinds into place.

Pansy takes Oliver's hand as they leave.

 

+

 

The only person Pansy says goodbye to is Madame Tonks.

The courtyard is empty. The carriage with Cedric and Cho, Millicent and Blaise has already gone, the sound of the horses' hooves soft in the distance as Madame Tonks settles the hood of Pansy's cape around her face.

"You will write to me, won't you?" she asks, trying to sound light but missing by an inch.

"Always. For as long as you will write back to me."

There is a smile on Pansy's face for the first time all day.

She places two kisses on each of Madame Tonks' cheeks. "I will miss you."

Madame Tonks doesn't speak again as they climb into the carriage, although she does fuss with Pansy's cloak, insisting she holds the door for them both, sorts Pansy's skirts once she's seated. "Take care of yourselves," she tells them both, letting her eyes run over Oliver. Oliver mouths a 'thank you' back to her, quiet and soft, with a smile on his face.

Pansy settles next to him, her hand against his leg.

"Now, go," Madame Tonks urges. "Before you are missed."

She tells the driver to go and there is a crack of reins before the horses turn the carriage and canter to the gate. Oliver takes Pansy's hand in his, squeezing her fingers inside hers as they travel past the Tuileries and out onto Rue de Rivoli.

He asks because he has to; because he hasn't all day and it has been waiting inside his mouth. To Pansy, he asks, "Are you alright?"

Behind them comes the sound of horses. By Oliver's estimations, there are eight mounted riders following them.

Next, Posey's voice travels through the air. "Pansy! Pansy!"

With a smile to Oliver and a quick 'I am, sir', Pansy leans forward and calls out to the driver, "Take the west road to the south, please. I wish to avoid Fontainebleau, thank you."

"Pansy!"

"Of course, Ma'am," the driver replies. The reins crack again and one of the horses snorts, the speed of the carriage picking up.

Removing her hood from her hair, Pansy leans back into her seat. Oliver wraps an arm around her shoulders, allowing her to settle against him. He kisses her hair once she is still, leaning his nose against her and breathing in her smell. She breathes in and out. Outside the carriage, Posey's calls her name again, shouting after them. 

But the sound of the horses' hooves stop.

Their carriage continues on.

  
  
  
  
  
  


**_T H E  E N D ._**


End file.
